Happy All the Time

by Laurie Colwin

The fact was that, while Misty was moral, Vincent was good. Watching him sleep it was revealed to Misty that the good do not necessarily have to maintain morality: they are born with it, while people like Misty, who were not good, had to strive mightily for goodness. That was what a moral system was: it helped you be good when you weren’t very nice. From Vincent, Misty learned that goodness and stupidity were not necessarily linked. You could be good and smart. Vincent did not judge: Vincent enjoyed. He enjoyed Uncle Bernie because Uncle Bernie was full of beans—because Uncle Bernie was there to be liked. Life was not as complicated as Misty had thought. With Vincent by her side, it was often as simple as Vincent thought.

It was one thing to theorize, Misty knew, but quite another to live. Misty’s theories looked down on the second-rate emotions such as jealousy. Since she had never felt it before, she had dismissed it as unworthy of feeling. Now she was in the grip of it. She stared it straight in the face and saw that the condition that jealousy covered was simply envy mixed with fear.