When you’re a pessimist the only proverbial wisdom you’re likely to recite would roughly be paraphrasing Murphy’s Law and so logically a true pessimist should experience no surprise when the inevitable occurs. Less eloquently put, when shit happens you imagine a defeatist’s expectation should offset any real disappointment.
However, as tonight, on the discovery that Rufus has, again, got ‘Cherry Eye’ (not as cute as it sounds), I feel really gutted. After budgeting for an extra lean year, with a wad of bills due by February I’m looking at another $1000+ procedure in the form of his weeping, puffy left eye. Out of the blue, his third eyelid suddenly burst forth red and inflamed. At least he is in good spirits and not rubbing it so I can spare him the indignity of having the lampshade over his head.
In an attempt to be philosophical about my very real exasperation, I’ve come to the conclusion that pessimism doesn’t protect you from disappointment at all and that indeed no matter how low your outlook on life may be, the world will somehow exceed your expectations by throwing some really horrible and miserable things your way.* Consequently, I suspect that my conviction that everything’s f**cked may have been false or my attempt at being optimistic may actually be taking effect.
* All things considered the eye isn’t really that bad. On a scale of 1 – 50 (1 being, let’s say, the dog chewing your headphones and 50 being, death in the family or loss of a limb, the Cherry Eye is a 4)
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