it's a great shame that the sequel book to "pollyanna" was called simply "pollyanna grows up", and not "pollyanna gets old, hurt, cynical, and tells the world to go fuck itself."
why? because regardless of how annoyingly over optimistic pollyanna was as a child, i can forgive it - in fact i would encourage it wholeheartedly - in a child. in an adult, I'd see it more as a sign of mental retardation. there is just too much bad, unfair, inexplicably cruel shit happening every second of every minute of every day, all over the world, for anyone with an iq in double figures and with two eyes and two ears to believe that everything is just a-ok.
are you depressed yet? well don't be. because there's a far more positive point I'm trying to make here. can you imagine getting out of bed every morning thinking the day was going to be just fuckin' peachy, that everyone was going to be nice to each other and that fluffy things would surround you and that no wars would start, people wouldn't get hurt, and that somebody, somewhere, wouldn't feel so miserable and so worthless that there was nothing else to do but end it all.
can you? for fuck's sake, what a daily let down that would be! every bastarding morning, you get out of bed and you tell yourself everything's gonna be just great and then shit after shit hits fan after fan and bastard after bastard does bad shit after bad shit, and every night you go to bed and try to tell yourself that tomorrow, yes tomorrow, it'll all work out better.
or you could be a realist, a cynic, what the pollyannas of the world would call a pessimist, and you could get up every morning knowing that some really bad things *could happen*. but you'd wake up, you'd look at the rain outside and you'd be happy that there was no flood. you'd take whatever little victories that came your way and you'd savour them, because each and every one was unexpected. and eventually you'd come to realise that it's all just random shit, some of it good, some of it bad - that we're no different to that long line of ants just doing the best they can to get home. that some make it back with their leaves, that others get crushed by the boot of a man who never even notices what he did.
and now tell me who is the smarter ant? the one who tells himself blindly that everything is cool and that the looming shadow over his head is probably just a cloud passing the sun? or the one who is always looking up for a size 12 cloud with "caterpillar" stamped into the tread?
i'll take my cynicism thanks, it makes days like today - where just a few simple, unimportant things went so very, very right - seem like i married a supermodel, won the world cup single handed with my arms tied behind my back, and wrote a booker prize winner before dinner. when a tiny insignificant little win can make you feel so content, you know you're on the path to peace.
i hope you all find the same, but only for brief moments...
...'cos that's what makes 'em so special.
why? because regardless of how annoyingly over optimistic pollyanna was as a child, i can forgive it - in fact i would encourage it wholeheartedly - in a child. in an adult, I'd see it more as a sign of mental retardation. there is just too much bad, unfair, inexplicably cruel shit happening every second of every minute of every day, all over the world, for anyone with an iq in double figures and with two eyes and two ears to believe that everything is just a-ok.
are you depressed yet? well don't be. because there's a far more positive point I'm trying to make here. can you imagine getting out of bed every morning thinking the day was going to be just fuckin' peachy, that everyone was going to be nice to each other and that fluffy things would surround you and that no wars would start, people wouldn't get hurt, and that somebody, somewhere, wouldn't feel so miserable and so worthless that there was nothing else to do but end it all.
can you? for fuck's sake, what a daily let down that would be! every bastarding morning, you get out of bed and you tell yourself everything's gonna be just great and then shit after shit hits fan after fan and bastard after bastard does bad shit after bad shit, and every night you go to bed and try to tell yourself that tomorrow, yes tomorrow, it'll all work out better.
or you could be a realist, a cynic, what the pollyannas of the world would call a pessimist, and you could get up every morning knowing that some really bad things *could happen*. but you'd wake up, you'd look at the rain outside and you'd be happy that there was no flood. you'd take whatever little victories that came your way and you'd savour them, because each and every one was unexpected. and eventually you'd come to realise that it's all just random shit, some of it good, some of it bad - that we're no different to that long line of ants just doing the best they can to get home. that some make it back with their leaves, that others get crushed by the boot of a man who never even notices what he did.
and now tell me who is the smarter ant? the one who tells himself blindly that everything is cool and that the looming shadow over his head is probably just a cloud passing the sun? or the one who is always looking up for a size 12 cloud with "caterpillar" stamped into the tread?
i'll take my cynicism thanks, it makes days like today - where just a few simple, unimportant things went so very, very right - seem like i married a supermodel, won the world cup single handed with my arms tied behind my back, and wrote a booker prize winner before dinner. when a tiny insignificant little win can make you feel so content, you know you're on the path to peace.
i hope you all find the same, but only for brief moments...
...'cos that's what makes 'em so special.