The gloomy freezing rain that we’re having right now in Ann Arbor pierces me to the bone, and makes me feel like feeling sorry for myself.
On days like this, I am reminded of a Charles Addams cartoon showing my favorite all American family at the window seat looking out at an awful rainstorm, while Mr. Addams leans back and says cheerily “Just the kind of day that makes you feel good to be alive.”
Now, here’s my existential problem for the day. I tend to be a morbid and gloomy person, so why am I not happy with the miserable and gloomy weather on this miserable and gloomy day?
Where’s my happy darkness? Where can I find my inner Charles Addams Pollyanna?
I need to be happy in my gloom!
Comments
10 responses to “The inner Pollyanna darkness of my outward Charles Addams happiness”
Whatever you do don’t look at the forecast for the rest of the week! I blame Bush
Well… I love blustery days. I can sit inside and sip hot cocoa and feel vaguely sorry for the poor souls caught in it, while happy that I’m not.
However, if it goes on for days, I get seasonal depression. If I were up there right now, I’d be curled in a fetal position in the corner, whimpering.
Letter from Charles Addams to James Thurber
“I have gotten a lot of letters about my work, most of them from criminals and subhumans, who want to sell ideas. I can rarely use them as they’re in the worst possible taste, but sometimes funny in a grotesque sort of way…A man from Boston sent a picture of a local shoe store, a very old one, with shoes for the club-footed, for shortened legs, etc.; underneath the window in gold-leaf on black it said, ‘Shoes for the entire family.’”
(The Years with Ross, p.254)
Well, Addams and Mr. Gorey are no longer with us, that’s a problem. If you have enough money, you can emulate those Romantic Era Brits who built “follies,” artificial gloomy ruins, on their estates if they weren’t lucky enough to already have gloomy ruins that Papa didn’t clear out long ago.
I just realized the cartoon was also a scene in Atlas Shrugged.
“The Years with Ross, p.254”
You about done there, Missy?
No market for historical fiction, and venting your spleen can’t be good for more than 150 pages self-published to your very best friends and family.
You need a new angle, a new angel or another lifetime.
Eric?
You’re roof’s leaking!
I’ve imagined myself in another place and in another lifetime. There was no roof, and no floor. No shelter. But there was rain, and that rhythm.
Ba..boon!
Ba..boon!
Ba..boon!
Never got over those monkeys, and never will.
SADLY, never got under a single one of ’em either.
I love rainy days when I don’t have to go out.
Unfortunately, today I had to walk to the bus, wait for the bus (their schedule is only a sort of guideline and is in no way meant to reflect reality), and after work I have to walk the 2 miles home.
At least I have a hat.
blustery days
The first mate LOVES to take me out on blustery days and kiss me with the wind rippling through her hair and mine. Even better is if we can get the wind with a very light rain.
I consider it fair compensation for the gloom.