A
philosophy professor of mine was talking to me once about watching his
children and other children
playing soccer. He said that he
thought watching children at
play was a good way to get a
handle on the concept of
joy. Then he said that when he watched the
parents and how they acted at the
games, he got a real sense of "
the fragility of human joy". I really liked that phrase. It brought to mind
images of
soap bubbles and
delicate,
beautiful things made of thin
glass. It is a phrase that comes to mind a lot when I find myself doing
mean or
spiteful things. I get these images of
midair splashes and
breaking glass. It is easy to
hurt people, I think. It's also easy to
forget that it's such an easy thing to do.
I
wonder where people
lose that childish joy they once had. I wonder how the
rainbows in soap bubbles turn to rainbows in
a puddle of oily water by the side of the road, and how those beautiful glass objects turn to
empty bottles of
Budweiser and
Jack Daniels. Seems it happens to
everybody in varying degrees. Maybe it is
inevitable. I hope not.