Putting My Best Face Forward

"Laugh and the world laughs with you...weep and you weep alone"...the British poet
Rudyard Kipling once said. This is one of the observations on life...learnt as a school boy...I have always remembered...perhaps because it rings true. Perhaps...if the truth be known...most people may be only short steps away from tears...as they face the inevitable difficulties we all face in life...not to mention...the shadow of a lurking mortality. Perhaps...because of this...we may carry in us a tendency...to avoid the tears of others...lest they nudge us towards shedding our own. Perhaps...putting a "pleasant face forward"...is simply one of the teachings...from a how best to survive manual...we each carry in us. If that is so...it also may account for the artificial smiles we see all around us...recommended as a central way to oil the wheels of commerce...taken from the survival over authenticity section of that manual. Whatever may lie under Rudyard's recommendation...I remember it once again this morning...so long after he said it...and for one more day...keep my troubles to
myself...and put my "best face forward".............Quester.