On cultivating one’s own garden

Consider the lilies, how they grow: they neither toil nor spin; but I tell you, not even Solomon in all his glory clothed himself like one of these.
[Luke 12:27]

They know me? They like me?
[Dr. Seuss’s Pontoffel Pock, Where Are You?]

The best compliment I ever got was from the Romaniacs’ mother, the Dragon. Or rather it was from the Dragon’s husband, the Romaniacs’ father/chauffeur; but it was about the Dragon. What you need to understand is, I pretty much worship the Dragon. She’s beautiful and good and fierce, and she has no time for me.

One day I was at Popeyes with the chauffeur, and he said, “___ [the Dragon] really likes you.”

That was the compliment.

It wasn’t surprising, because I’d been noticing a softening in the Dragon’s (distant) face. Still, it was good to hear. The Dragon is not effusive. And she has no time for me.

After a few moments, I pulled myself together and said, “How long did it take for her to like me?” “Oh,” my friend said, “about four years.”

Four years.

Two things, I knew at once. First, what an achievement it’d been, getting liked (for who I was!) by the Dragon; all my demonstrations of intense, guileless integrity had finally started paying off. The second thing I knew was that for the rest of my life, with person after person, I’d have a tough row to hoe.

It’s so crucial to be liked, to have some appreciation given you; otherwise, like a shaded flower, you’ll wither and die. But for it to be meaningful, the appreciation can’t be grounded in falsehood. Your integrity must be complete. And that’s what makes the hoeing so very tough.

I write in order to be liked. Like Pontoffel Pock, I seek appreciation — affection — all over the world. These days I’ve been getting page views from Russia, from the Philippines, from Luxembourg. … They can’t all possibly be from real readers; I don’t know what robots they’re from. I don’t understand how the Internet works.

But sometimes I’ll get page views from Montana, from British Columbia, Romania, Ecuador. I can guess who those readers are. Those page views make me happy. And I get hundreds of views from Indiana, which warms my heart, even though I don’t track the different readers.

All this effort to be liked. And yet there’s One who sees perfectly through my guilelessness, who likes what He sees: despite my efforts, not because of them.

Respite/remorse

Yeah, Ecuador defeated Paraguay, yeah, yeah, yeah. The hero was Jefferson Montero. We are good. We are very, very good.

Six more games. The arithmeticians say that in order to qualify for the World Cup, we need just 5 more points (5 draws, or else 2 draws + 1 victory, or else 2 victories (which’d give us 6 points)). I can’t get my own calculations to agree with the arithmeticians’, but OK.

I liked how savagely you blasted George Saunders, my friend said. (My friend had given me George Saunders’s book.)

I felt badly about that, I said.

(We were at Popeyes.)

Why? said my friend, with the kindest expression.

You know, I said. I’m biting the hand that feeds me.