I was roaming around the UConn campus late one foggy night and found myself yet again by the banks of Mirror Lake, feeling sorry for myself about some inconsequential misperceived slight, or an unnameable absence in my peripatetic existence.
From across the pond came peals of carefree male laughter, two friends enjoying the luminous night air. Their joy rankled, insulting my hard-earned gloom. Without thinking, my anger welled up and shouted out, "Shut the fuck up!!!"
The laughter stopped. There was a pause.
"Why so angry?" came back across the water.
"Because life SUCKS!" I bellowed.
Another pause, longer this time.
Then, "Look at the good. Look at the good in your life."
He had me there. I was flummoxed. I wasn't about to get in a debate with the guy across the heads of the ducks. And compared to where I had been previous to UConn, there had definitely been improvement, and therefore, there was good. And, callow youth that I was, I was still not so dense as to fail to recognize that there were many, many people who had it far worse than I.
I walked slowly back to my dorm, thinking on the voice from the mist.
To this day, decades later, it stays with me. I wonder if the voice remembers that night. Whenever I get down and cop a squat on a pity pot, it comes back to me. I can always find something to be grateful about. On the flip side, one can never know the impact a positive comment can have on another - it can ripple outwards further than imagination.
From across the pond came peals of carefree male laughter, two friends enjoying the luminous night air. Their joy rankled, insulting my hard-earned gloom. Without thinking, my anger welled up and shouted out, "Shut the fuck up!!!"
The laughter stopped. There was a pause.
"Why so angry?" came back across the water.
"Because life SUCKS!" I bellowed.
Another pause, longer this time.
Then, "Look at the good. Look at the good in your life."
He had me there. I was flummoxed. I wasn't about to get in a debate with the guy across the heads of the ducks. And compared to where I had been previous to UConn, there had definitely been improvement, and therefore, there was good. And, callow youth that I was, I was still not so dense as to fail to recognize that there were many, many people who had it far worse than I.
I walked slowly back to my dorm, thinking on the voice from the mist.
To this day, decades later, it stays with me. I wonder if the voice remembers that night. Whenever I get down and cop a squat on a pity pot, it comes back to me. I can always find something to be grateful about. On the flip side, one can never know the impact a positive comment can have on another - it can ripple outwards further than imagination.
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