While he was alive, my father said he preferred the company of animals to the company of people. At the time, I thought he only meant my company. After all, we’d both outgrown the idea my living under the same roof with him. I didn’t take it personally. We both knew when it was time for me to go. However, in retrospect, I believe Rocky was actually making a more general statement about the human condition because the older I get, I more I get to be like him. These days, it seems the more people I meet, the fewer I wish to know. Not because of how they look, but how they act. I already know enough people who behave like Melvin Udall, before he fell in love and became human. For example, real-life Rocky and fictitious Melvin shared more than one personality quirk in common. Hostility, much of it fueled by racial prejudices, increases by the day. People no longer stop to think before they speak, or about the feelings of those they are ripping to shreds. They don't even bother to listen to the civilized debate point the other is trying to make before shouting them down. Instead, these very angry people just unleash their vitriol at will, because it feels good to let it all hang out. Often though, it is blind hatred directed against an innocent bystander, not directed anger at another who actually caused them harm. And the smarter someone thinks he or she is, the more likely they will feel empowered to call the target of their derision an idiot, a moron, or an animal. Interestingly enough, only recently someone rather vociferously asserted that I was a … [Read more...]