Grudges

“I can hold a grudge like a Sicilian elephant.”   (from the Get Fuzzy comic strip, July 24, 2011)  Now isn’t that just the absolute ultimate of descriptions about a grudge?  Of course, Bucky Cat, the famous feline from Get Fuzzy, is the statement maker.  And the phrase started me to thinking about grudges. 

Now ordinarily I stay away from grudges.  They’re just too much trouble to carry around and require too much time and attention to maintain, but in this summer of my discontent, it just may be that I’m ready to make some exceptions.

For instance, this summer horribilis, to paraphrase Queen Elizabeth II, is just about more than I can accept with equanimity.  It isn’t enough that we’ve had to deal with record-setting heat and record-setting drought at the same time.  There’s the pain and worry of watching all those folks along the Mississippi watch their homes be destroyed, and not to mention the Souris River in North Dakota and folks along the Missouri as well.  And the perception that most of the world is going to hell in a handbasket, what with all the war and famine and pestilence.  And what was that fourth horse?

No matter what side of the political spectrum one is on, most normal people care most about a certain few things:  food and shelter for their family; a chance to earn an income; education for their children; a belief that there will be help in time of trouble.  And then there’s our illustrious Congress, who may learn that the American people sometimes have a lot in common with Sicilian elephants.