DISAPPOINTMENT

I am always reminded after an election, looking at the popular vote, how divided this country is. Fifty-some million people are happy today, but 48-some million are disappointed. That's a whole lot of people to be disappointed, or upset, or bummed, or devastated, even. For however invested, there is a substantial portion of the population that has to deal with the idea of loss. There will be those who pout and whine,or lash out in anger, or withdraw into fear and sadness, and those who accept and move on. We all have to deal at some point with disappointment, the downside of having hope, expectations unfulfilled. Nobody gets everything they want. Well, I don't really know that. Maybe there is someone out there who does, like a Saudi prince, who has every conceivable possession, human or not, available to him at any moment of any day, plus runs a country and all the businesses in it or something. Or, on the other side of that, maybe there is a chicken farmer in Uruguay who is damn happy if he gets another sunrise and his birds are healthy. Perspective, I guess.

Is that it? Ask for less, expect less, then never be disappointed? I know people try to do that, but I don't know that it really works. Hope is such a persistent bitch. Does it naturally always set itself to one notch above what you have? I mean, even for the chicken farmer, one of those birds is gonna get run over by an errant truck sometime, huh? It just seems against human nature to have to tamp down the need to believe in and want something greater, whether those are material things, political ideals, personal growth, whatever.

How people deal, how long they remain disappointed, is a matter of resiliency, how fast one can move back to the hope state again. It is based primarily on two things: internal self-concept and external support. To not be brought down by disappointment, you have to have a sense that you have some control over yourself and your reactions, that you are able to successfully adapt to situations you weren't expecting, that others will help you along when you struggle and that you can ask for their help, and that there is always a way to make something positive from something negative. This has to be genuinely felt; just agreeing with the concepts doesn't work. Resiliency may be the factor, I sometimes think, in whether a life can be classified as "happy" or not. Are people born resilient, or made so through experience? I suppose it is a bit of both things, as everything always seems to be.

Not all disappointments are deep, of course. I am not going to wig out if that cool leather coat doesn't fit quite right, or that it is raining on me yet again, or that I missed getting the free coffee at Starbucks yesterday. But I wish I were more resilient, that things didn't bother me like they do, that the roller coaster of Hope and Disappointment wasn't so twisty and turny and didn't leave me exhausted and nauseated half the time. That would be a cool theme park: Knott's Psychology Farm. Think of the haunted house alone! The Hall Of Phobias! The Relive-Your-Own-Birth Flume Ride! The Metaphorical Hay Maze! Ha!

Well, even though I do not share in today's political disappointment, I have empathy. It's just the Conservatives' turn at the bottom of the ride. The carnie is beckoning, get on out now, somebody else has been waiting in line for their turn. Never argue with the carnie in this theme park, or he'll put you on the Broiling Pit Of Hellish Perseveration ride.

The Uruguayan chicken farmer started a band, named it Los Mockers after a line in a Beatles film, sang in accented English, and kept smiling. I made that up, sort of, but it could be true. In my mind, he's that kind of resilient guy.

I have got to eat

So every day I work

And I've have to dress

so I must do my job

I don't want to work

but I must to feed you

I don't like my job

but I've got to dress you

What a life!