Smilin' Through

On December 30th 1919, at the famed Boardhurst theater, Broadway, the famous play Smilin' Through, opened. From that title, a song, a movie and much rhetoric has ensued, that you can learn to smile through anything. Zane Grey, in his 1925 book, The Thundering Herd, said, “you can say anything if you smile when you say it.”

I tried smiling many times when someone “told me off”, whether a girlfriend, patient or irate family member, it either made things better or worse, but always completely disarmed the other person. Most people, angry with you, want you to become angry in return, this puts everything on an even playing field. Maturity dictates that there will be angry people in your life, there is nothing you can do about it. Many children are reared thinking that the world is a place of pleasant things, pleasant people, pleasant thoughts, everyone should learn, early in life, that there is much turmoil in human existence. The 20th century was the most evil century in history, 100 million killed in war. Human beings have brought lying, cheating and stealing almost to perfection.

I had not been married many months when I learned a next-door neighbor was angry with my wife about some small insignificant matter. One day I saw my wife about to live the house with several of our nice wedding gifts. I asked, “what are you doing?” She said, “I am going to give her some of my things, I want her to like me.”

There are more mental disorders in the United States than all the rest of the world together. Evil is the greatest mystery of life, get used to the fact that everyone is born evil, and some do not get far from the starting gate. Even animals trained to do tricks, when injected with the blood of a schizophrenic person, will forget all their abilities. Psychosis is organic, and neurosis is a part of most human being's physiology, in either case, the human animal is a complex genome, and life is a process of adaptation.

About the time you learn to live, it is time to die, neither wealth nor wisdom will bring happiness. It is simply a matter of making up your mind to live a contented life, and learning to accept others where they are, not where you wish them to be. If only I could live life all over again, I would know that children are not expected to act like grownups, and I would know that grownups are usually doing the best they could with what they had. We never know how much baggage another individual is carrying around, we only understand others when we walk in their shoes just a short distance.

One of my friends told me about leaving home as a young person, his parents were fussing and fighting all the time...money, their childrens behavior, attitude towards family members and neighbors. He planned his escape very carefully, saved his money from his part-time job, packed just the clothing he thought he would need, a few mementos. He planned his escape, knowing exactly where he was going and what he would do when he got there. He went to the bus station and bought his ticket, left town, never expecting or wanting to return. But, (and there is always a “but”) on the long bus trip he got to thinking that his parents were probably doing the best they knew, they did not know any better. They both came from homes where there was fussing and fighting, an ancestry of mere survival.

He said, “I never went back, made my own way, I cut myself totally off from my family, I ran into someone about 10 years laters, from my hometown, who knew my family, he told me that both of my parents had died and he did not know what had happened to my brother and sister.” My friend told me, “I chose to make my own life, a much better life than I had seen, I did not want to wind up like my folks.”

The first memory I have of my father's parents, my grandparents, as a small child, was them fussing. I even remember what the fussing was about: who was going to pay my aunt's college tuition? Until 1920, women could not even vote, my grandmother had inherited property and my grandfather's name had to be on the deed. As the same time, her children would inherit just as much as she, in case of my grandfather's death. Many married couples of that era had separate bank accounts, separate property agreements, often couples lived together simply because of property arrangements and children. Divorce was unheard of, couples simply tolerated one another, simply because it was expected by the families, by their church, and by their community. In my youth, very little money was spent on politics, in local elections, well-grounded people simply asked responsible people to assume leadership. Only citizens of good reputation, having shown responsible attitudes in their vocations: farming, businesses, professions, those whose veracity and honesty was beyond question were asked to serve in public office.

Everyone took pride in their government and their political leaders, it was seldom that you heard any criticism of political leaders, pastors, even parents. It was a better world, a world of honesty, decency, responsibility, the settling of family disputes, neighborhood disputes, church disputes, in rational, civilized ways. Knowing that a good name is rather to be chosen than silver and gold, that your greatest asset is family, friends, a community. You cannot buy a good name for yourself or your family, and we have certainly learned we cannot buy our way into prosperity, cannot buy local or national security, that the failures of a few bring the downfall of many. Tragic that we do not realize what we have lost until after it is gone, not an occasion for smiles.