Pessimists R Us

While there may be a few upbeat people in my family (my daughter for one), we are for the most part a pretty pessimistic lot. For us the glass is definitely half empty. Some of us are worse than others of course. My youngest son Alex is a case in point. For Alex, the glass is not merely half-empty; it is down to its last drop, and there will never be any water to fill it up again, so we might just as well break the glass and use it to cut our throats. (All this while he's standing next to a perfectly functioning faucet, and we live in Seattle for Pete's sake, not Death Valley.)

Alex comes home from school on Friday afternoon and is excited for the weekend for all of maybe 10 minutes. Then he sighs and says tomorrow is Saturday and then comes Sunday and then I have to go back to school. The weekend is over!!!

But, I must admit, he comes by it naturally. With a family like ours, he has no chance. The last time I saw my youngest brother Robin, I asked him how he was. He responded, "Oh, I've never been worse... But there's always tomorrow." I laughed, but I don't think he was kidding.

Actually, Robin and Alex have always reminded me of one another. I think it's the youngest child syndrome. The only differences I've noticed, really, is that Alex doesn't have long straggly hair or a chronic smoker's cough.

My mother might object to being called a pessimist, but she is. When I was young and got excited about something, she'd always talk me down. I remember coming home all giddy and telling her I was "going" with so-and-so. She responded, "Where are you going?" When I was 20 or 21 and temporarily back living at home, I was all excited about buying a used Toyota Celica. I wanted it bad, and was pretty sure I could afford it. She said, "You don't want a car." Deflated, I didn't buy the car (and, 31 years later, I've never bought another one either).

When I was 22 and had my first real apartment, Mom and Dad came to visit. I talked about the guy I liked, but Mom said, "You don't want a boyfriend; they're nothing but trouble." About 15 minutes later, she let out a deep sigh and said, "I guess I'm never going to have any grandchildren." I mean, you can't have it both ways, Mom. As it turned out, she got grandchildren from my brother Richard long before she got them from me. Now she has 5 grandchildren and at least 7 great-grandchildren. And I'm the one sighing about not having grandchildren.