You Get Into The Habit Of Being

There's A Rule, I Think. You Get What You Want In Life, But Not Your Second Choice Too.

Many Americans Think Of The Rest Of The World As A Kind Of Disneyland, A Showplace For Quaint Fauna, Flora And Artifacts. They Dress For Travel In Cheap, Comfortable, Childish Clothes, As If They Were Going To The Zoo And Would Not Be Seen By Anyone Except The Animals.

Even When We Say Nothing Our Clothes Are Talking Noisily To Everyone Who Sees Us, Telling Them Who We Are, Where We Come From, What We Like To Do In Bed And A Dozen Other Intimate Things.

There Is A Peculiar Burning Odor In The Room, Like Explosives. The Kitchen Fills With Smoke And The Hot, Sweet, Ashy Smell Of Scorched Cookies. The War Has Begun.

But I Think That Sometimes, When One's Behaved Like A Rather Second-rate Person, The Way I Did At Breakfast, Then In A Kind Of Self-destructive Shock One Goes And Does Something Really Second-rate. Almost As If To Prove It.