Do The Right Thing

Once one is caught up into the material world not one person in ten thousand finds the time to form literary taste, to examine the validity of philosophic concepts for himself, or to form what, for lack of a better phrase, I might call the wise and tragic sense of life. By this I mean the thing that lies behind all great careers, from Shakespeare’s to Abraham Lincoln’s, and as far back as there are books to read-- the sense that life is essentially a cheat and its conditions are those of defeat, and that the redeeming things are not “happiness and pleasure”, but the deeper satisfactions that come out of struggle.

-F. Scott Fitzgerald

I have this quote on the wall of my apartment, just above my computer. A friend of mine called earlier, seeking advice, and I wanted to share it with him, but I would have felt silly reading that long a passage over the phone. Besides, as we covered during the course of the conversation, there are some things that you can say out loud and some things that you can write, and they’re not always interchangeable no matter who you are.

Now the conversation itself is a private matter, and certainly not something I would share with a (theoretically) broad audience, even if I had permission to do so. But in general terms, it dealt at one point with an issue that I’d been mulling over for the past few weeks, and on and off again since I was a teenager.

Someone I trust told me once that I am not an easy person to know. I wouldn’t think so. I have my fair share of issues, and more problems than I like to think about (and I don’t mean the kind of things that could be fixed if I had more money, or time, or talent). I’m depressed a lot, angry a lot, and awkward pretty much always. Still, I don’t think that’s what she meant. I don’t think any of that makes me a particularly hard person to know.

I hold the entire world and everyone in it, including myself, to a ridiculously high standard, which leads to unrealistic demands and expectations. I am uncompromising and stubborn on what I consider matters of principle. And because I value honesty above anything else, I am prone towards bluntness, which too often translates into rudeness.

As I write this, I feel terrible about it. Because I understand why that must be difficult to endure, and how taxing it must be on the people I care about. But I don’t know how to change any it, or if I even want to. My standards are high, but not unreasonable. I have difficulty compromising sometimes, but that’s because sometimes I don’t think I should have to. And as much as I deplore rudeness, I’d gladly accept it in exchange for the honesty that is missing in so much of our lives.

I decided once, a long time ago, that it was better to be right than to be successful, or popular, or happy. I have not changed my mind. It has cost me friends, it has cost me money and opportunity, it has even, on occasion, cost me happiness. I wish that wasn’t true, but I accept it. I’ve made countless mistakes and I regret all of them, but I’ve never regretted being right. Even though I know that that makes me a hard person to know.

On another wall, I have another sign that reads “Do the right thing”. I spend my life trying to live by that rule, trying to do what I think is right. I’ll keep at it no matter what. I am prepared to make sacrifices for what I believe in. That’s one of the few things my parents taught me that I’m grateful for.

I believe that no matter how many setbacks I face, I will find the things I am looking for in this life-- happiness, success, companionship. And when I do, I want to have earned them.