| Subject: | Re: Of wisdom |
| Posted by: | Hen Hanna (henhan…@gmail.com) |
| Date: | Wed, 5 Jul 2017 |
On Wednesday, July 5, 2017 at 3:08:19 PM UTC-7, Anton Shepelev wrote:
> I have set down this fragment of an interview I just
> saw on the TV by way of an exercise in the writing
> of, as THE COLONEL used to say, a coherent para-
> graph.
>
> My grandfather paid little heed to the household,
> but that summer, unexpectedly, he had planted car-
> rots, and by coincidence it was the summer that I
> first fell in love. I could not conceive of a bet-
> ter way to please the girl than to give her the
> whole yield of our carrots, which I did. But the
> next day she went for a stroll with another boy,
> four years my elder (I was seven.)
>
> Futher to aggravate my distress, the very same day
> my grandfather asked me to make a salad for him
> specifically with his own carrots, so my theft was
> soon discovered. I had a dreadful scene with my
> parents, which left me miserable, and upon which I
> went to my room and lay on the sofa in stark depres-
> sion.
>
> Then who should come in but my grandfather. "What is
> the matter?" asked he. I told him all -- that I had
> met with a betrayal from the girl I loved and with a
> lack of understanding from my family. That was a
> moment, I said, for any decent man to terminate his
> life.
>
> "Is it a well-pondered and final resolution that you
> have made?" he asked, to which I answered, calmly
> and with perfect sincerity: "Yes, absolutely." "I
> respect your decision," he replied. I was shocked
> and knew not how to continue the conversation. "I
> trow", he went on, "now that you have made your
> choice, it does not matter much whether you effect
> it right now or any other time." "No, it doesn't," I
> said indifferently. "Then you can do it in the
> morning, so let us now go to dinner. But do not
> tell your parents about it or mum will be sorely
> disappointed." I found it reasonable and agreed.
>
> In the morning something distracted my gloomy
> thoughts and made me postpone the suicide till a
> later time. Then what with one thing, what with an-
> other, I kept postponing my self-desturction until
> it left my mind, imperceptibly to myself. I admire
> the wisdom of my grandfather, who in simple words
> explained the formula of life to a little child.
>
> P.S.: My own grandfather offered me a cigarette when
> I was six. "Come on", he said, "do it like
> the grown-ups." The experience -- the sour
> taste, the burning in the throat, the acrid
> smoke that brought the tears -- was so dis-
> gusting that I have never thought of smoking
> again.
that doesn't work with beer. HH
Of wisdom posted by Anton Shepelev on Thu, 6 Jul 2017