The Germans have a different word for everything

 Hi everyone,

Today is supposed to be a nice day before the weather turns again. At least that's what some weather forecaster said this morning. I don't know that I really believe her or not, but I just discovered that Google's spell checker for emails considers "know't" as a word. I'm going have to look that one up in my handy Merriam-Webster Dictionary, which is never out of reach.

Another word that I had to look up is "schadenfreude," but my copy of M-W didn't have it. I always have to look it up. (If you were to look around my home computer, and even at work, you would find scraps of paper with words that I usually have a difficult time spelling.)

Anyway, I've been thinking a lot about schadenfreude lately. It is a German word that describes the emotion of, instead of feeling sympathy, you feel pleasure at someone else's misfortune. Watching television yesterday, I could sense a lot of it from some commentators. In fairness, the shoe has been on the other foot over the past several years. In a sense, everyone in the country seems to find pleasure in the suffering of others. This is just a general feeling, when it comes to it, I still believe we'd all help our neighbors and our friends if they were in need.

However, it seems like we've lost a lot of empathy and sympathy for each other. Instead of feeling for someone who has lost their job or had fallen ill, we tend to think "better him than me."

This pandemic has hit us all pretty hard and while there are public service announcements featuring rich celebrities telling us we are "all in this together" the truth is that we pretty much feel on our own with this.

As a result of all this turmoil, I think we're all feeling a little schadenfreude.

I don't know and don't care what a person's political leanings are, but I agree with the words of George H.W. Bush, who left a note for Bill Clinton on the desk of the Oval Office on Jan. 20, 1993. "Your success is now our country's success. I'm rooting hard for you. Good luck."

I for one am going to work at rooting for someone's success (as long as it doesn't come on the back of others) instead of finding pleasure in failures.

Sorry I got a little preachy this morning. I'll be back to funny tomorrow, I promise.

R

 

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