If there’s one thing I like, it’s a quiet life. I’m not one of those
fellows who get all restless and depressed if things aren’t happening
to them all the time. You can’t make it too placid for me. Give me
regular meals, a good show with decent music every now and then, and
one or two pals to totter round with, and I ask no more. Bertie Wooster by P. G. Wodehouse

Only hours ago – ascending in the elevator to the 2nd floor of the apartment building with Lynne from the subterranean garage – we together summarily remarked that, in spite of it all, we’re bound to carry on with a degree of majesty and forbearance.  It was a gripping philosophic account punctuated by the contrite but inescapable adage, “No one is listening; nobody cares.”

The axiomatic truth of life is that, whatever the consequences we’re fated to endure, the only practical resolve is to cushion the blow by anything approaching buoyancy.  It is apodictic. The alternative is not only less compelling but also wholly without advantage.  Whether drawing near the tureen – or already in the soup – it only matters to carry on. There is besides no loss that warrants insinuated misery. This is especially meaningful when discovering (as I so often do) that the lives of those whom we honour as experts, professionals, leaders and artists are lives frequently animated and strengthened by a history of difficulty and error – sometimes to the point of imprisonment. Other than the extreme of confinement there is a breadth of penalties which encompass every imaginable misfortune. Far better – in spite of the exposure to endless contradiction – to devote one’s precious capital to the translation of life upon our private and preferred terms; not to be governed by rules or conventions.

My growing conclusion of this broad view is that it were always better to have corrupted the flow of life with one’s self-evident terms. There are naturally moments of cause for remorse and reconsideration arising from this sometimes blunt application. But just as Aunt Agatha learned of Miss Hemmingway at the Roville resort en France, not all popular persuasions are to be trusted in the face of manifest indifference. Being oneself is a demanding enterprise, one from which the reward of complacency is no small compliment.

Whether it is a developing habit – or whether it merely reflects the competing violation of youth – change to the way things have been done in the past is recurring. Often it is dismissed as vulgar; or, perhaps, that it is designed merely to provoke attention. Neither of these unfavourable comments is sufficient to sanitize the authentic expression of self. I confess to less sympathy for a theme driven only by retail ambition (and there are many recognized advocates who are thus controlled). Otherwise – that is, free of calculated advantage- I have burgeoning accommodation and compliment for anyone who exhibits an honest rendition of themselves.

It becomes easier with old age to relieve oneself of certain shackles. Some of that may not be news of any report – rather the discovery may be an unwitting expression of sensibility in the past. Our instinctive behaviour is such that it may require time fully to connect the dots of activity with intelligence. But make no mistake, the two are connected. Presently my overwhelming absorption is the “quiet life”. It is a demonstrable venture with a list of convenient and undeniable hobbies and routines, none of which is especially dignified but each of which constitutes an unequivocal link to placidity.

Featured Image: English: Illustration from page 61 of Wodehouse, P.G. (1910). The Intrusion of Jimmy. New York: W.J. Watt & Co.