Things That Are Not Unpleasant
Hello! Nice to meet you. What team are you on? Are you with us? Or them? Are you right or wrong? Did you vote for the idiots or the other idiots? Who tells you what to think? What do you prefer: post-fact or fake? Don’t care? Care too much? Wish it wasn’t like this? Wish it was just you, sitting on a pier, looking at the sea with a slight breeze in your hair and an ice cream, thinking about Things That are Not Unpleasant?
This is a Public Service Announcement. We can’t organise the pier. Or the ice cream. But here are some Things That Are Not Unpleasant.
A hot meal on a cold night after a big day is not unpleasant.
Standing outside on a dark, quiet, clear night, with a view of the stars is not unpleasant.
It is not unpleasant to stand, or sit, with your eyes closed, while live music, played by real people with fast fingers and focused minds, rises through your chest as though your body is playing along without you knowing how.
It doesn’t matter how old you are, making a new friend is lovely.
Mozart’s clarinet concerto isn’t awful.
Pelicans exist.
A really good stretch is not just pleasant; it can completely transform an afternoon.
It is not unpleasant to witness a thing - a certain type of bird or a YouTube video or a man on a bicycle singing opera or a well-told joke at work - and to know, immediately, the exact person you are going to tell about it, and to realise that your anticipation of their response is making you smile.
There are always, however things might seem, smart people quietly working hard to make things better.
You know what’s not unpleasant? Real, fun mail.
It’s not unpleasant when you see something out of the corner of your eye and realise it is a tiny aeroplane, high up in the sky, cutting through the blue from somewhere to somewhere else and you realise that right at that second, while you are doing whatever it is you’re doing - putting out the washing, buying a sandwich, stressing about a bill or a letter or a text or an argument - there are hundreds of strangers in that tiny little aeroplane sitting together while they wait to be somewhere else. And you hadn’t been thinking about them but now you are, and tomorrow who knows where they’ll be?
Bubbly water with ice blocks in it is really just water plus some science, but it feels kind of posh and sparkly.
It’s not unpleasant when you’re in a crowded place - an office or public transport or something - and you realise a loved one has privately surprised you with something. They’ve snuck some chocolate in your bag, or written a note or texted you something amazing… and you find yourself instinctively looking up, as though such a momentous occurrence cannot possibly be invisible to everybody else.
Seawater is pleasant. For toes. For sinuses. For looking at while having a cup of tea.
It’s not unpleasant to be in a country town on a day when the volunteer firefighters get a call-out. To witness the cars pulling in one-by-one, someone slipping quickly out of each of them, this one eating a piece of toast, that one in paint-covered clothes, everyone interrupted, swiftly clambering into their uniforms in a truck that is gone now, quickly and efficiently, down the road and in the direction of whatever is the matter. Wait a minute and the next few will arrive, do the same, take the next truck out, hopefully to return with just a false alarm and an update from Dave about the progress on the decking.
An evening walk is rarely unpleasant. A nice little bridge into the night time.
So maybe you’re on the wrong team. Maybe you’re a terrible person. Maybe everybody is shouting at each other and the sound is white noise. You might as well tune it out then. Go for an evening walk. Have a glass of science. Send somebody something lovely in the mail. This has been a public service announcement.
This column originally appeared in The Big Issue.