En Passant: On the mysteries of life

YOU KNOW WHAT, as I’ve got older I like to think that I’ve got wiser, but I’m not sure that I really have. I may know more, but is knowing more equivalent to wisdom? I don’t think it necessarily is. I’ve known some clever idiots.

I read every day, not only in the normal course of events working at a newspaper. Even as a bottlestore manager I was a reader. Even as a child I was a reader. I have read more books than I’ve had hot breakfasts. I have pondered stuff, but there are still questions that remain unanswered. In fact, the more I learn, the more questions I have.

Like for instance: what would chairs look like if our knees bent the other way? All our lounges would look entirely different, dining rooms would look space age, and there’s be no such thing as a bench. What would the inside of a bus look like? And a toilet? Now there’s something to contemplate.

Here’s another poser: why aren’t curtains double sided so that your window, with the curtains drawn, looks as nice on the inside as it does if you’re standing in the garden? Seriously, how attractive is it to have the lining showing to people approaching your front door?

You could say, why does it matter if you are inside? and I agree, but I would have thought that certain women would have pounced on the idea of dual-sided curtains, those women that insist on the toilet lid being closed when not in use, for example (because it looks better!), or those who in the morning arrange a dozen pillows on a made bed, and then throw them off each night before getting into bed. That’s another total mystery to me.

And then, how come everyone driving faster than you is labelled an idiot, and everyone driving slower than you is a total moron, and both are suspected of getting their licences out of lucky packets bought at Checkers? And is the person who you overtake and the person who overtakes you, of the same opinion? They probably are.

And I ask this question because I had a Fanta Grape cooldrink this past weekend: why do they call it grape flavour when no grapes I’ve ever tasted and smelled even remotely resembled the taste and smell of the liquid that came out of the can on Saturday. Orange tastes more or less like orange, granadilla vaguely like granadilla, but grape tastes like… I dunno, but not like grapes.

And how would the police handcuff a one-armed bandit? Is there a standard procedure, laid down in a constable’s manual, for the apprehension and subduing of one-armed criminals? Does the question even pop up at the Police College? And when a mime is arrested, do they advise him that among his rights he has a right to talk? Is that in the manual?

Is it rude, I wonder, among deaf people, for a deaf person to “talk” (meaning using sign language) with their mouth full of food? For people who can speak and hear, it is considered vulgar to chat with a gob full of meat and potatoes, except if you’re in an American movie with a scene in a pizza parlour. Let’s face it, at the best of times it is disconcerting to talk to someone and to feel a tiny droplet of that person’s spittle land on your lip, and you can feel it however small. And you have to stand there like a dummy waiting for an opportune moment to wipe it off without appearing to do so. How much worse is it if that person has a mouthful of snake and pygmy pie! But among deaf people?

And then, if the municipality puts up the price of being buried in its cemetery, do we blame that on the cost of living?

And you know if some people swear they add, “If you’ll pardon my French”; when the French swear do they say, “Si vous me pardonnez mon Anglais” (or something like that)?

Then there’s the possibility of a severely neurotic person becoming addicted to counselling, how would you counsel him or her without pandering to that addiction?

It is also a mystery why if you blow into a dog’s face the sensations appears to irritate the animal, but if you take it for a ride in the car then it cannot wait to get its whole head out into the passing breeze. The question is why, if it can’t be answered by the word halitosis.

And then there’s the mystery of the mattress sale – is there ever a time that you can’t find mattresses on sale somewhere in one or other furniture store? What is it about mattresses? I mean, how often do you buy a mattress? Why do furniture stores think we will be tempted to buy a new mattress because its “on special”? Am I the only one, maybe, not fixated on new bedding?

And how come, in a metamorphism more startling than a tadpole to a frog, when you take a completely ordinary person, a completely down-to-earth unaffected person, someone as uncomplicated and humble as you and me, how come when they become politicians they adopt the persona of demigods?

Now, that is the real mystery.