When everything screams go

When everything screams go, why do you stay?

Why would you persist in something you know might not even work? Why do you insist on devoting your time, energy and soul into something that may not even be worth it in the end if it doesn’t last?

You do it because you secretly hope for something that will change. That will make the fantasy in your head the reality that you live.

Thomas Edison tried and failed many times before he finally invented the electric light bulb. He himself stated, “Our greatest weakness lies in giving up. The most certain way to succeed is always to try just one more time”. Effort doesn’t have an expiration. All it needs is your perseverance.

Would you consider yourself crazy for staying, when everyone else leaves? Because as everyone rushes to the door, you stay to put out the fire. Greek writer Nikos Kazantzakis believed that “every man has his folly, but the greatest folly of all is not to have one”.

It takes more courage to stay than to simply run away. Because you know what you have to deal with. You know that the situation is not in your favour. But you still choose to deal with it and fight rather than surrender and abandon all hope.

Maybe you are a little crazy for doing so. But remember, “those who are crazy enough to think they can change the world are usually the ones that do”.

Raising a castle from the ground

My grandmother always told me that you should never give women a response as vague as “do what you think, dear”. Because if you do, she is not responsible for the surprise you will receive.

I think she was the one who invented this rule.

Grandfather was always specific with his responses. He never said “do what you think”, but always presented her with at least two options. So, for example, if she would ask “what do you want for dinner tomorrow?”, he would say “how about some fried chicken, or perhaps some lamb stew?”. He had realized that if he offered two options, he would at least get the one. But there were always times when grandmother decided to implement a third option that she herself had decided upon.

Women are crazy and insistent like that. There was no way you could understand the manner their minds worked. Grandfather said it was not even worth trying. You would sooner be driven crazy than even begin to comprehend them.

Grandfather had learnt his lesson when during the early years of their marriage he had gone off on a three-day hunting trip with his friends. Grandmother was left alone in the house, having plenty of things to do and being content with simply running the household.

But she soon got bored and on the second day called grandfather to ask if he wouldn’t mind a few changes being made in the house’s construction. He gave the unfortunate response of “sure, do whatever you think is best, my dear”.

Grandmother kept herself busy, frantically and excitedly creating in reality what she had already constructed in her mind.

When grandfather returned two days later, he had to run around the house twice, thinking he made a wrong turn somewhere and ended up at someone else’s house. The house he had left, that simple, stone-walled maisonette he had departed from, had disappeared and in its place there had been erected a renaissance-style villa, with fifteen steps and a huge porch leading to the two-doored entrance of a three-storey house. The back yard featured a stable and a hencoop, while the entire perimeter was confined by an elegantly crafted wooden fence. Grandmother rushed out to greet him, beaming with joy. “Do you like the new changes?” she asked, obviously rhetorically. Grandfather was speechless. Grandmother took it to mean he loved them.

Women are crazy like that. They can raise castles out of molehills in less time than you need to go to the market and return. Yet they will always ask for your opinion, even for something simple as the colour of their shoes, but never listen to what you say. Either way, you have to admit, life would be really boring without them.