Nice is just so boring….

Kindness

Oh my, this internal dialogue! We’re feeling a bit snippy today.

Just so boring to be nice. Who wants to talk about being nice? Plain ol’ vanilla - that’s what this being nice thing is. Get a life, Jan!

I DO have a life and let’s be honest, it’s built around being nice. Whatcha gonna do about it? Throw brickbats at me? Of course, that wouldn’t be nice, would it? But my iPhone’s at the ready for a quick video of your “not being nice” actions!

Now, wait a minute, wait a minute! That isn’t being nice either, siccing the threat of iPhone videoing on me.

What can I say? I’ve been overcome by our culture’s “gotcha” ethos. It’s in the air we all breathe….

Why is it so pedestrian to talk about being nice? No blood, guts, or expletives? Let’s be honest, nice is a 4-letter word, too. However, “nice” doesn’t have the cachet of those other, more volatile, 4-letter expletives that tend to incite visceral reactions. A visceral reaction to “nice?” Ho-hum. Not so much. Just plain ‘ol vanilla, right?

Speaking of visceral reactions, we are living in a chaotic world, alive with, with…I can’t even begin to find words to describe the almost unreality of our global pain. Selfishly, I’d settle for some plain ol’ collective vanilla niceness right now.

OMG, Jan’s doing her ostrich imitation, burying her head in the sand!

I am not burying my head in the sand! I’m just wishing for more light in this darkness. The last I heard, a 24-hour day was made up of both dark and light. Dark and light are both kosher, as my Yiddish forebears would say. So there! (Confession: the “so there!” is a verbal equivalent of sticking my tongue out at you. And here I am, once again, tainted by our cultural ethos of being mean. Sigh.)

OK, OK, I need help winding down this “being nice” screed. Ah, let’s call on the incisive words of Toni Morrison, late Nobel Prize winner in Literature, to move us along.

“Evil has a blockbuster audience;

Goodness lurks backstage.

Evil has vivid speech;

Goodness bites its tongue.”

Goodness, niceness, both among those plain ol’ vanilla behaviors of living in the world can get lost in our culture. Of course, evil, also present, must be addressed. Absolutely. But let’s honor and give needed airtime to niceness as the valuable life ingredient it is. Now, c’mon, how many cooks are reading these musings? All together now - vanilla is one of the most commonly used ingredients in a kitchen. Does it not augment other flavors in any given recipe? If you answered “no,” go find a copy of The Joy Of Cooking and revel in the deliciousness of that very ordinary and omnipresent ingredient, vanilla. (And try eating devil’s food chocolate cake, minus the vanilla…)

OK, I’ve made a great pitch for niceness as a vital life ingredient. And now, one more from the pen of Toni Morrison. Here’s to “allowing goodness its own speech.” You bet! I’m on board. (Y’all planning to join me?)