To Be Happy, Forget to Regret

By CHARLES M. GUTHRIE
Of the editorial page staff
Published by the StarTribune
October 24, 1959



   NOBODY can be perpetually happy. This is perhaps just as well. It might get monotonous. Still, happiness is a boon, and those who enjoy a greater portion of it than the rest of us aren't just lucky even though they may be healthier and naturally more optimistic. Whether or not they realize it, they also have a happiness formula.
   Pursuit of happiness is a constitutional right but many of us chase it with less verve than do others. Those who chase it hardest appear to be happy even when stretched on a hospital bed or playing canasta. From all visible manifestations they are gloom-proof.
   They are not gloom-proof. Nobody is. But they have more-than-average happiness because they've learned to shrug off misfortunes and not relive embarrassing scenes. They can forget financial blows, flubbed bridge hands and loss of possessions.

   WHY, after the initial shock, should a husband be rankled by the fact that his wife blew $30 for a pair of shoes or a purse? Stern admonishment is permissible as a hedge against future folly. But what purpose is served in repeatedly asking what will be used for money to pay for the stuff? This only makes for bad blood.
   Or if you lose the grocery money playing poker, you only compound your misery by wishing you hadn't. The boys won't return your money and you might as well charge it all off to experience, resolve not to let it happen again, and dismiss the loss from your mind--if your wife and the grocer will let you.

   THE PEOPLE  of little happiness are those who wish they could do it all over---and do it differently. They grieve about the jobs they should have taken and didn't, or the jobs they took and shouldn't; the stocks they bought or didn't buy, the wrong cars they purchased and the accidents they shouldn't have had. They suffocate in a slough of it-might-have-beens.
   Weeping and repining never took the wrinkles out of a fender or undid a mistake. Mistakes are water over the dam. They serve only as guides to the future. And the loss of a watch, ring, jacket, glove or scarf is not vital enough to curdle the future.

  I WRITE from bitter experience. The whole subject is close to my heart. Regret is with me almost constantly and new hats only fleetingly. I have a talent for losing toppers that borders on genius. And because I used to mourn such losses exceedingly and wallowed so much in self-condemnation, it was difficult to find happiness until I adopted the mental attitude that happy folks have. Now the "forget it" formula is working for me, too.

   After going without a hat all summer, I was driven by the autumn chill to the hat box on the closet shelf. Removal of the lid established the dismaying fact that no hat was there. It hadn't been there, apparently, since early summer.
   I made half a dozen unrewarding phone calls and then said to heck with it. There were other hats. But often at night, before sleep came, I lay in bed and suffered, trying vainly to retrace the comings and goings of months ago when I thought I was wearing a hat.
   It was the best hat I ever owned, but its loss will worry me no more. It's probably hanging in quiet, neglected dignity in some roadside cafe. I hope though, that this is not so. I am not little. I hope it's being worn and giving comfort and satisfaction to some lucky stiff whose right to it is questionable. I'm as happy as if I still had it--or never had it.
   It was gray with a black band. It was size 7 5/8 and had my initials inside. If it doesn't fit you, I'd appreciate a call.


Copyright 2017 StarTribune. Republished here with the permission of the StarTribune. No further republication or redistribution is permitted without the express approval of the StarTribune.