Derek and the lawnmower

Derek came over to me at breakfast – depressed as usual. I said to him ‘Doesn’t the warm weather cheer you up?’
‘No,’ he said. ‘It reminds me of summer in suburbia. The sound of lawns being mowed, cars being washed, dreams being broken. Suburbia drove me mad - literally.
‘ I looked out the front window one Sunday morning: the neat lawns, the tidy fences; the double-glazing, the cars on the drives. And suddenly the smallness of it all hit me: small boxes of houses, small gardens, small cars, small ambitions, small minds.
‘I went into the garage and filled the mower with petrol. I wasn’t watching what I was doing; I was dreaming of Africa. I filled the tank too full, and petrol sloshed over my shoes. I sighed, and carelessly lit a cigarette.
‘The rest, as they say, is history. They managed to save the house. In hospital I was visited by a psychiatrist. He didn’t believe it was an accident. Neither do I. Jung says there are no such things as accidents. I believe him.’

I feel sorry for Derek. As I have said before, there is so much of him that reminds me of myself. But I can’t hang around with depressives, can I?

I opted for the prunes. Roughage, that’s the thing. Though you can have too much fibre. It’s all a question of balance. The ‘third way’, as the Buddhists say. And you never see a constipated Buddhist.