Nobel prize winner Ernest Hemingway put a shotgun in his mouth and blew off his head. Most of us, though, exist somewhere between Christina Onassis and the bag lady. Our own hearts bear the greatest witness, the most irrefutable evidence of our unhappiness. How quiet, how desperate, it varies, but all no matter how quiet have been desperate. Men do snatch hints of happiness, but those are often as fleeting as a breeze.
Love brings bliss, but that love often turns to hate, the bliss to misery.
We chart divorce, disease, and infant mortality, but lines, dots, and figures can no more depict the pain than a hoarse whisper can reproduce Beethoven's Ninth Symphony. We dream, but our dreams are rarely fulfilled. Yet Lennie, with a flimsy mind that couldn't control his hard muscles, accidently killed a woman, and frenzied avengers stalked them through the woods. George, wanting to spare his best friend from the rage of a lynch mob, stood behind Lennie, who sitting along a river bank didn't see the gun in George's hand. George raised the gun and his hand shook, and he dropped his hand to the ground again.