How an Optimist Views Horse Manure
Segment # 154
It is difficult to remain positive with all that we have been confronted with in the past 4 years. Somehow D Day June 6th with all that was sacrificed at this time, it seems appropriate to remember what has been overcome in the past. None of this evil is acceptable but perspective and perseverance should be our common bond to end it on November 5th. In the meantime Ronald Reagan can give us a moment of reflection.
“Over lunch today I asked Ed Meese about one of Reagan’s favorite stories which, I heard him tell it a thousand times.”
The joke concerns twin boys of five or six. Worried that the boys had developed extreme personalities – one was a total pessimist, the other a total optimist – their parents took them to a psychiatrist.
First the psychiatrist treated the pessimist. Trying to brighten his outlook, the psychiatrist took him to a room piled to the ceiling with brand-new toys. But instead of yelping with delight, the little boy burst into tears. “What’s the matter?” the psychiatrist asked, baffled. “Don’t you want to play with any of the toys?” “Yes,” the little boy bawled, “but if I did I’d only break them.”
Next the psychiatrist treated the optimist. Trying to dampen his outlook, the psychiatrist took him to a room piled to the ceiling with horse manure. But instead of wrinkling his nose in disgust, the optimist emitted just the yelp of delight the psychiatrist had been hoping to hear from his brother, the pessimist. Then he clambered to the top of the pile, dropped to his knees, and began gleefully digging out scoop after scoop with his bare hands. “What do you think you’re doing?” the psychiatrist asked, just as baffled by the optimist as he had been by the pessimist. “With all this manure,” the little boy replied, beaming, “there must be a pony in here somewhere!”
“Reagan told the joke so often,” Meese said, chuckling, “that it got to be kind of a joke with the rest of us. Whenever something would go wrong, somebody on the staff would be sure to say, ‘There must be a pony in here somewhere.’”
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How I miss Ronald Reagan’s way of using his good humor to make important points!
For example, we could use a bit of humor in reviewing how the “powers that be” are dealing with current daunting challenges of the Washington “Swamp.” Consider a few important issues that are, or at least should be, front and center among the matters occupying the attention of our elected and appointed leaders, their staffs and supporters — and the rest of us, whatever our political persuasion.
“I will not stand by and watch this great country destroy itself under mediocre leadership that drifts from one crisis to the next, eroding our national will and purpose,” he said in June of that year. “The time is now, my fellow Americans, to recapture our destiny, to take it into our own hands.”