"It is pleasanter to be five years older and beautiful than status quo and under par, but I must force my loose mind into its overalls and get going."
— O'Connor, Flannery (1925-1964)
Work Title
Date
1944; 2018
Metaphor
"It is pleasanter to be five years older and beautiful than status quo and under par, but I must force my loose mind into its overalls and get going."
Metaphor in Context
February 2, 1944
It is pleasanter to daydream than to work. It is pleasanter to be five years older and beautiful than status quo and under par, but I must force my loose mind into its overalls and get going. Once I am in, at least, I stay put. I think I will go back -- way back -- to when I first began. What I know about it is only hearsay. There is so little I know about them that I sometimes wonder just what they must have felt and how they must have acted with me. Me! Red and ugly with my latent heat, dribbling and drooling, howling and yelling, and otherwise letting nature take its course. But I was theirs and they loved me; and they never stopped, though at times it must have been mingled with contempt and kept alive by conscience. They probably enjoyed me more the first three years than they ever did later. I was too little to kill their pleasure then, too little for them to kill mine. When I grew less ugly (and from pictures I did show remarkable improvement after the first year), they must have had high hopes; they must have struggled even harder. I was totally unaware of them -- except as a satisfaction for my necessities. If, in my animal state, I recognized possession, it was because they were undoubtedly the most agreeable-looking creatures in cradle distance. Their heyday came when they got me home, though. I guess that day lasted about four years. I was their plaything, and I hope they played. They have never got a chance since.
It is pleasanter to daydream than to work. It is pleasanter to be five years older and beautiful than status quo and under par, but I must force my loose mind into its overalls and get going. Once I am in, at least, I stay put. I think I will go back -- way back -- to when I first began. What I know about it is only hearsay. There is so little I know about them that I sometimes wonder just what they must have felt and how they must have acted with me. Me! Red and ugly with my latent heat, dribbling and drooling, howling and yelling, and otherwise letting nature take its course. But I was theirs and they loved me; and they never stopped, though at times it must have been mingled with contempt and kept alive by conscience. They probably enjoyed me more the first three years than they ever did later. I was too little to kill their pleasure then, too little for them to kill mine. When I grew less ugly (and from pictures I did show remarkable improvement after the first year), they must have had high hopes; they must have struggled even harder. I was totally unaware of them -- except as a satisfaction for my necessities. If, in my animal state, I recognized possession, it was because they were undoubtedly the most agreeable-looking creatures in cradle distance. Their heyday came when they got me home, though. I guess that day lasted about four years. I was their plaything, and I hope they played. They have never got a chance since.
Categories
Provenance
Reading
Citation
Published under the heading "Higher Yearning," in Harper's Magazine (February, 2018). <Link to harpers.org>
Date of Entry
01/23/2018
