First of all: that's very good news to hear, Art. All good wishes.
Secondly, as I was reading through these really interesting posts, I was thinking to myself: nobody has mentioned tragedy/misery inspiring comedy, and there, you went and said it for me, Art !
As far as straight, serious songwriting is concerned, the half dozen or so I have ever written I have kept safely away from public consumption because they are so bloomin' miserable. They are what I call "No Exit" songs. They served their personal purpose for me at the time (as people have been discussing in the 'Were We Ever That Young?' thread). The only one I have ever dared give a public airing was much more recent, and I posted it here a year or so ago, about the Winter Solstice. The difference with that one is that it was born out of a very deep sorrow and emptiness, but it does have a positive "Way Out" sign at the end: the 'outside perspective' that you spoke about, Jerry. In the same way as I can't now survive in the world thinking that there is 'no exit' from the hard times, I don't think I could ever finish anything which doesn't have some positive turn to it, somewhere, no matter the circumstance that inspired it.
There is no doubt in my mind that the tough times are the ones which spur people on: it's a kind of survival instinct. What we do to survive depends on different personalities, I think. I don't think it is necessarily age-related, either. My survival has always been towards comedy. When I was about eight, I 'survived' a miserable summer holiday in a grim guest house in Norfolk by writing dozens spoof illustrated hotel brochures, and I have been doing the same kind of thing ever since, creating ever-so-slightly (or tremendously outrageously) over the top characters and situations for stories, monologues or drama scenes. Somehow, being totally serious doesn't suit me - though on every occasion, the spur has been needing to cope with/deal with some kind of pain or obstacle, and that is the layer underneath it all.
Here is a quote from a wonderful old book: "The Craft of Comedy", which is an exchange of letters written by the actress Athene Seyler:
"What, then, is at the root of comedy ? The essentials are: lack of balance, distortion, over-emphasis or under-emphasis, and surprise. Now, all these things are only relative to something else: the truth."
For me, when the truth of life and the living of it is too much to take straight, I *have* to have the "lack of balance, distortion, over- or under-emphasis, and surprise" in order to survive. So I turn to comedy - either created by others, or by creating it myself.