On being a grown up

I have mentioned in this space before how much I enjoy Frederick Buechner's writing. I have been most recently reading "The Season's Difference," which has thus far not really captured my attention. The books on Leo Bebb were amazing, and this is just not to that level.

And yet, then you come to passages like this one ....

"It's only in a fairy tale," he went on, taking his time, "only in a story written for children, that you can trust life -- not really life, you understand -- to that extent; where you're told and can be certain that if a particular thing happens or does not happen, all will be well. If only the prince can kill the dragon and set the princess free, you're promised they'll live happily ever after, and you know they will, Peter, and they do! But in the real world, my friend," the softness left his eyes, "and in tragedy too - how funny it should apply to them both - you can't help but realize that no such problem is made or, if it is, that the chances are it will be broken, broken because there are the haggling, miserly demands of so many other facts and conditions, and the world is no longer innocent enough, as perhaps it once was, to be unaware of them and to live a good and happy life on the simple basis of the fairy tale: do this, and all will go well for you. In real life, Peter, you not only have to kill the dragon and set the princess free, but you have have to set a hundred other and less innocent things free, too, and imprison as many more; you may have to kill more than one dragon, maybe thirteen, maybe even yourself, and even then, when you've done all of this, done it nobly and well, the whole situation will have changed. Then you may discover that all you've done was not only unnecessary but sometimes even worse than that, sometimes even as wrong and harmful as you thought it was right and good."




Even in the middle of an otherwise mediocre novel - thus far, there is still time for it to grow and become more than I expect - there are bits like this that make the whole endeavor worth the time.