A:
Well, you know, I definitely have a better idea of where some people are coming from.
B:
What do you mean?
A:
Well, I've obviously always lived a pretty charmed life. And it's not like I'm facing any real hardship now, at all, my mantra of "I remain the luckiest man alive" is at least metaphorically genuinely true. But it's fair to say that the bloom is off the rose, or, I've lost some of my sheen or something.
B:
Well, it's not like anybody was cheering for you to get your comeuppance.
A:
I hope not. I feel like everyone has been rooting for me, you know? I haven't picked up any schadenfreude vibes or anything from anyone. But yeah, so anyway, I feel like I understand other people better. I've moved beyond a sort of intellectual understanding of certain kinds of pain, to really being able to ID with people struggling with various things. And everyone's circumstances are different obviously, and most people's are still way tougher than mine, and there are better or worse, or at least healthier and less healthy ways of dealing with things, but yeah, I feel like I can appreciate people more, see where they're coming from better.
B:
Well, that's a good thing right?
A:
It should be. It definitely should be. But at this point, yeah, I don't know. I really don't like it. I've always had this sort of snotty attitude toward the people in history's garbage bin who went down arguing for their own exceptionalism. You know, "What's the problem, Pope Whatever? Does it blow your narrow little mind that the Earth is just another planet, that the universe doesn't orbit us? Are you too parochial to really grok that humans aren't special cases, that we fit right into the spectrum of the great apes?" And now, yeah. I don't know. I've definitely lost my snotty attitude there.
B:
Well, this is your boy's thing, right, DFW? Doesn't This is Water talk about the importance of an Other-centered outlook, and compassion and companionship towards your fellow man? How you don't want to be "Master of a tiny skull-sized kingdom" and all that? Even Einstein had something about this, he wrote it in his neighbor boy's yearbook or something
A:
Look
B:
I mean, you're human, man, and this stuff is all part of the human experience, it really is
A:
Look look look. You're right, you're right, you're totally right. Honest to God, I believe you. I'm just not there yet, I'm not.
B:
I get that, it's ok, man.
A:
I hope it is.