“Dr. Chumley, my mother used to say to me, ‘In this world, Elwood’ — she always called me Elwood — she’d say, ‘In this world, Elwood, you must be oh, so smart or oh, so pleasant.’ For years I was smart. I recommend pleasant. You may quote me.”
-Elwood P. Dowd in the play Harvey by Mary Chase
I think it would be nice to live by this quote. Of course I don’t usually. I’m usually still caught up in the oh, so smart mode. But I’m working on oh, so pleasant.
Here is a random observation that veers into half-baked philosophy: it is just as easy to be nice as not most of the time. For example, if somebody you don’t like says “good morning” in a pleasant tone of voice, you can smile and say, “good morning” back. It’s not that hard. Apparently for some people it is.
My next random observation veers into middle-aged musings (you see how well I can multi-task): when you’re in your late 40s, you will have pain. Today it’s a muscle spasm in my shoulder, making it difficult to turn my head or use my right arm (and yet I’m writing this. How dedicated am I?). It’s actually adding a little interest to my morning. As I hold myself stiffly, I’m pretending I’m the guy with the deformed hand in The Brain that Wouldn’t Die (a fun movie with or without robot heads).
Although, as I think about it, I realize you can have pain at any age. There are headaches and period cramps and sore muscles from athletic endeavors. I remember a friend of mine who suffered from migraines saying, “I wonder what it would be like to go a whole day with suffering any pain.” A guy looked at her and said, “I often go a day without pain.” Well, some people are blessed, that’s all.
A woman at work who dislikes me was maneuvered by circumstances into smiling at me. I was walking down the hall more or less level with a management type. She smiled at him then turned her head in my direction, probably not knowing who it was. She was still smiling and I was past her before she had time to stop! Ha! She can’t say good morning, but for one teeny tiny second, she smiled at me! Hey, point and laugh if you must: I take my joy where I can find it.
Incidentally, the woman did have chances to give me dirty looks later (at least, maybe they weren’t dirty looks at me; maybe she was in a fowl mood and I was in her line of vision), which led me to a Christian thought. If Jesus could forgive people who crucified him, how much more should I forgive somebody who merely gives me dirty looks.
Well, I do love Lame Post Fridays, where I just sit down and write whatever comes to mind. If you’ve been entertained, yay! If you’ve been bored, thank you for bearing with me. The nice thing is now it’s the weekend, and I have various Mohawk Valley adventures planned. Stay tuned!
Mohawk Valley Girl 