Thursday, April 23, 2015

Corn Flakes

I can't eat corn flakes because I always want the last bite to be the best and it's the soggiest and the worst. I'll pour a little more in the bowl craving the crispness, repeatedly, until I give up, feeling full and foolish and not very good generally. 

This must be the problem with addiction. You want the purity and excellence of the first experience and you can never get it back, but you keep trying. Addiction is horrifying but its cousin, self-indulgence, is fun. Self-indulgent people are fun. 

That capacity for simple enjoyment, without vanity or an invidious element, is as human as it gets. It grounds us in life and, please God, I'll take all that kind of simple grounding I can. I was taught to alleviate suffering wherever possible.

I have no problem beginning with myself. Having been raised a good Catholic I am probably overly aware of my faults, a strange form of egotism, but I say this for myself: when I find a good thing I want everyone to have it. I'm a born sharer. 

May you and everyone have as much simple pleasure and as little pain and addiction as possible. It's my wish and it's not even Christmas but, what the hell, that's my mood.   


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