A Way With Words (Read This Now)

I came across the wonderful piece as I was scanning Couriers from 100 years ago. It was published Nov. 28, 1907 and appears to have been written by then-publisher J.J. Mendel, who was widely known for his way with words. This is Mendel at his best. It is humorous, entertaining, poetic and touching all at once. It's long but well worth the read. I now keep a copy in the folds of my wallet:

There are times when every thing seems to go wrong. From seven o'clock a.m. till 10 p.m. affairs are in a twist. You rise in the morning and the room is cold and a button is off and the beefsteak is tough and the stove smokes and pipes burst, and you start down the street nettled from head to foot. All day long things are adverse. The ink bottle upsets and spoils the carpet. Someone gives a wrong turn to the damper and the gas escapes. An agent comes in determined to insure your life, when it is already insured for more than it is worth, and you are afraid someone will knock you on the head to get the pride of your policy, but he sticks to you, showing you pictures of Old Time, the hour glass, and the death's scythe, making it quite certain that you will die before your time unless you take our papers in his company. Besides this you have a cold in your head, a grain of dirt in your eye and you are walking uneasy. The day is out of joint and no surgeon can set it. Be careful and not write any letters while you are in that terrible mood. You will pen some things in the way of criticism or fault findings that you will be sorry for after wards. The table would be poorly set that had on it nothing but treacle. We need little vinegar, mustard, pepper and horseradish that brings the tears even when we do not feel pathetic. If this world were all smoothness we should never be ready for emigration to a higher and better world. Blustering March and weeping April prepare us for shining May. This world is a poor hitching post; instead of trying fast on the cold, cold mountains, we had better whip up and hasten on toward the inn, where our good friends are looking out of the window watching for us to come up.