Something Good Over The Rainbow

“Happiness is like a butterfly: the more you chase it, the more it will elude you, but if you turn your attention to other things, it will come and sit softly on your shoulder.” — neither Thoreau nor Nathaniel Hawthorne but often attributed to one or the other

Thanks to Kris Gage for the quote.

This is true … and it’s because Happiness is the bastard offspring of Hope¹ and some other of the nasties from Epimetheus’ jar ².

I once went to a butterfly ‘sanctuary’ dressed in a pair of black moleskin fatigues and … feeling the urge to sit and calmly observe things for a while …. found a bench upon which to rest my weary bones — oh, okay, my lazy posterior.

Now … my then girlfriend, being something of a ‘Goth’, was dressed pretty much entirely in black, so, much as the colour was a, if not the, major factor in what happened next, there was more to it than simply that.

You see, over the years, the observation has been made, by a number of people, that I am astoundingly calm and patient ³.

They were astounded because, no matter how many years they’d known me, it was not a facet of my nature they had particularly observed.

Well, duh — if you’re patient, others won’t know, will they? And, furthermore, you can’t be patient without being calmly so, can you?

Of course, how calmly patient I am depends upon you.

And, I have all the time in the World for butterflies, as I’m sure you can imagine ⁵.

So … even though my girlfriend was dressed, head-to-toe, in black and I only in a pair of black trousers, guess which of us was chosen by the jet-black butterfly to serve as a place to rest its weary wings.

That’s right … because, unlike my girlfriend at the time, I’m not an utter basket-case — I would ask if all women are clinically insane or just the ones that seem to gravitate towards me but asking around my friends it seems that, no, they gravitate towards them too … ergo, all women are clinically insane ⁶.

Anyway …

After a while, my lunatic girlfriend grew bored of sitting there, gazing in wonderment at the butterflies ¹⁰, and determined that we should continue our journey through the butterfly house, see the last of it and then exit through the gift shop.

Of course the butterfly didn’t move as I stood — I’m calmer, safer, more reassuring and more inviting than a tropical plant brimming over with nectar!

Of course it didn’t fly away as I … hesitantly, lest it come to harm in any way … started to walk along the butterfly path — but who would, once they’d become accustomed to me?

And, so, my manically impatient girlfriend and I proceeded through the butterfly house at a pace somewhere just shy of one (1) metre per hour ¹¹ whilst I marveled at how miraculous my luck was that … in a huge environment built especially to house it … a butterfly should have chosen my leg as a safe, comfortable place to rest and felt so secure there that it would cling to me even as I walked about.

Eventually, the harpy with AD/HD on crystal meth I called my girlfriend declared that three hours in a butterfly house was more than enough for anyone and I could come to some arrangement with the keepers about adopting the butterfly, smuggle it out with me or live in the butterfly house for the rest of my life for all she cared but she was going home.

I did try to come to an arrangement with the keepers, as it happens … but, sadly, they weren’t willing to let me move into the butterfly house 😒

And so, my heart breaking as we did so, between us the keepers and I persuaded the butterfly to seek alternative lodgings and I stumbled, sobbing inconsolably, after the Wicked Witch of the West Country ¹⁵.

Okay, so … apart from my dreadful girlfriend, obviously ¹⁰ … so far so lovely— unlike Hope, which … unlike the other nasties Pandora released … doesn’t hurt us the once but, instead, kills us a little more inside each day (it’s a cruel thing, Hope, and the Greeks didn’t refer to it as they did without reason).

And so it is with Happiness: if we calmly get on with our lives, it will unexpectedly land upon us, filling us with wonder and joy … only to break our hearts and leave us with the revelation that Happiness is not something we experience but something we mourn the loss of when it is gone from our lives.

On the up side though, my girlfriend and I split up shortly afterwards — so something good came of it at least.

Anyhow …

When I was a kid, there were so many butterflies around that you could walk through clouds of them every day in the spring/summer — just as fog consists of ground-level clouds of water vapour that surround us on all sides, so the spring/summer consisted of clouds of butterflies all around you.

There were so many that people didn’t remark upon them; sure they were pretty … a delight to the eye … lifted the heart and made the soul sing with joy … but they were just … you know … butterflies — there were so many of them that walking through clouds of butterflies … even in a town or city … was an everyday occurrence and nothing remarkable ¹⁷.

Naturally, I paid more attention to them than that … marvelled at being surrounded by clouds of butterflies each and every time it happened … could be distracted by the merest flash of a wing — I have, indeed, always had something of a ‘butterfly mind’ as it were.

And I learned something important about them … and, consequently, Life.

Whilst other kids were playing their games, I was far too busy chasing butterflies to be king of anything.

Except, perhaps, of chasing butterflies.

Because, the thing is … you don't catch them ... you chase them.

Yes, you can sit calmly and wait and, if you’re insanely blessed by the Universe one will land upon you … which is a joy to be sure.

But in the meantime, you can improve the chances of that happening by going where the butterflies are … putting yourself in the middle of them as they swirl all around you in a cloud.

Don’t wait for it to happen … chase it; because, even if it never does, at least you were surrounded by butterflies as you did so — and nothing in this world beats chasing around like a wildthing, grinning and laughing as the butterflies flutter around you.

So, there you go …

Reasons to be joyful ... reasons to be miserable ... a bit of both perhaps ... but you can't go wrong with butterflies even when they're not at the end of a rainbow.

Chase butterflies at the ends of rainbows — Life’s too short for anything else.

P.S. When you’ve listened to Something Good, watch the video for the ’08 Remix — the only reason you might not grin your head off is that you have no soul ¹⁸.

—

¹ Or, rather, deceptive expectation — they were a canny lot, those Greeks, you know and it turns out that they … like me … were of the opinion that Hope was the nastiest of the lot.

² Yes, this is a bit of a puzzle for those of you not versed in classical era history, but I’m sure you’ll work it out — Wikipedia is your friend.

³ I am, as it happens — you’re all still breathing ⁴.

⁴ I rest my case.

⁵ Don’t try my patience — yes … you can!

⁶ I think it must be the hormones or something ⁷.

⁷ Either that or the way their brains are wired ⁸.

⁸ Or, possibly, genetic — they’ve only got ‘X’ chromosomes after all … so, benefit from none of the ameliorative ‘Y’ chromosomes ⁹.

⁹ Whatever … women are batshit crazy and that’s all that matters really.

¹⁰ As I have observed in the Past … women have no souls.

¹¹ That’s how calm and patient I can be ¹².

¹² If you’re a butterfly at least ¹³.

¹³ Or a sparrow ¹⁴.

¹⁴ Or any one of a number of creatures that, unlike human beings, don’t make the World a worse place to live for their being here.

¹⁵ Or wherever we were — I don’t remember ¹⁶.

¹⁶ You can’t expect me to pay attention to minor details like where in the World I am right now — there are butterflies!

¹⁷ Like women, people have no souls.

¹⁸ You can’t watch so many people clearly having such a good time without grinning like a loon yourself.