Posted on 10/21/2017 6:27:48 AM PDT by T-Bird45
I was talking to two friends in their twenties recently, about our travel experiences in foreign parts, and we circled around like an airplane looking for a landing place before we all agreed that foreign parts are all very well, but they’re not… comfortable.
Now, sometimes it’s worth it to endure some discomfort in the name of travel — of seeing new places and broadening your horizons. I put up with an awful lot of it when I was a kid, traveling by train across Europe. It was worth it because I had stuff to see and places to go.
But… In normal life? Every day? We Americans get all sorts of opprobrium from Europeans and other self-designated superior life forms about our obsession with being comfortable, being at ease, doing things in the easier, most direct, and – often – cleanest way possible.
Agatha Christie in “At Bertram’s Hotel” makes a comment about Americans liking their rooms warmer in winter, and needing air conditioning in the summer. There was a faint sneer to the words. Americans, you know, like to be comfortable, and aren’t hardened, easy-going travelers like the rest of the world. They don’t put up with discomfort and inconvenience with a smile. For some reason, this is held against us.
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The old country was not a pleasant place for most and average folks were treated very poorly. They came to the US with great expectations which were fulfilled and they didn't expect handouts. They expected to make it on their own and they did. They learned independence and self sufficiency.
IMO, it was the tough folks who made the journey and from this toughness they made their way in the new world. What doesn't kill you makes you stronger. By surviving this great hardship and being successful in the New World, we Americans established a standards and expectations that were and are above the average peasant's. For that reason, we Americans don't want to be pigeon holed into “a class” as many Europeans are.
Bottom line: we must not feel guilty about being an American and this new and different standard that we expect from others and live by ourselves. That doesn't mean that we should be rude or disrespectful.
My parents, born in the 1920s and raised in Brooklyn never even considered air conditioning for our south Shore LI home. I, on the other hand, never having suffered a Brooklyn summer, never considered living without AC once I was on my own.
We spent our honeymoon there...couple years before it got wiped out...the resort was nice...never had a hooker hit on me & my wife before just walking down the street
Only in America do you find a high percentage of the poor obese?
Few are truly “poor” here...few.
It was a huge mistake and that first summer was he!!. We survived but by the second summer we had air conditioning. It might be the difference in architecture, a brand new home or maybe the area was warmer and more humid. But no doubt we needed air-conditioning!
As we have learned in our travels, the East, South, and Midwest can be miserable. It is the humidity that is a killer.
I often wonder what life was like in those areas 100 years ago. Worst of all, no deodorant and a once-a-year bath (whether you needed it or not).
I didn’t make it up, couldn’t find a reference with a quick google search. He more or less expressed the same sentiment.
Thanks T-Bird45.
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