Some time ago, a study was done of people who had won big time lottery money. The researchers found that after the initial excitement wore off, people returned to their previous levels of contentment. Those who were happy before generally remained happy; those who had been miserable before returned to their usual state of depression.
Male or female,some people retain a positive outlook on life no matter what and others crab and moan and are eternally dissatisfied. (Most of us, including me, fall somewhere in the middle – we’re not Miss Mary Sunbeam every day, but we’re a long way from slashing our wrists.) Dowd is one of the chronically miserable. Sure, the NY Times is going down the tubes, but MoDo’s life would not be considered a terrible one by most people on the planet. She gets paid far more than her meager talent is worth, she lives in an exciting city, she’s not bad-looking, she doesn’t have to dig through trash cans for her next meal. And she’s utterly incapable of appreciating what she has.
Mary Jackson’s advice is excellent: think about being a female in Afghanistan and then thank God for what you have. Or better yet, pay a visit to a Children’s or VA hospital. You won’t be thinking about how tough you have it then.
