Today's Tomorrow

“If we hope tomorrow is going to be better than today, does that mean someone was praying the day before yesterday, that today would be better than yesterday?”

“Half the time I don’t know what you been smokin. Where does your mind find time to worry about yesterdays, tomorrows, todays? I got a big enough problem worryin about what I might be likin for lunch.”

“That’s because you don’t have faith. Faith is a wonderful thing. It washes away the yesterdays, todays, and leaves only tomorrows. There are no mistakes, no shootings, killings, any of the crazy stuff in tomorrows, cause they ain’t happened yet. How do you suppose we can get to a place, where tomorrow is today?”

“Girl, you done lost me. I’m having a hard time not callin 911 to find out if they got an opening, so that you got somebody to talk to. I ain’t that person, and you are startin to make me feels like I needs a vacation, and you know me, don’t believe in goin someplace when everything I don’t have, is right here.”

I have to admit if, it weren’t for the fact we is related, I think I’d believe she was left on the doorstep. But I got pictures of when she was born, or close to it. I don’t think my mama would lie about a thing like that. Bein older she has the edge of bein the one who is supposed to know the most, but I’m thinkin something happened when they passed out the light bulbs that is supposed to go on in your head.

When we was littler she was always thinkin of ways things could get better if we just did this or that. She never seemed to care if it didn’t work out for us as long as it worked out for someone. I don’t think she even thinks of herself as a real person sometimes. She’s livin like she is in some book where everything always turns out for the best. Can’t figure out where she gets that attitude. My mama, although a good woman in some ways, was what you could call, not bitten by the ambition bug. Daddy, what I knowed of him was that he liked to bet on tomorrow too. Just usually in the form of horses. He got killed by a drunk driver when I was only about seven. Daddy was drivin apparently, so we had no one to blame, or ask for money. 

Saint Gracey, that’s what I call her. She don’t like it much, but then, I think in private she kind of likes it. Just that in public she’s afraid people will think she’s putting on heirs, and that would never do in her book.

You don’t ever want to get her started on some people being better than others. Judgin she says is the shame of a generation and she knows that once we sees the error in our ways, we are goin to see it too, and change. She sees the sun come up on rainy days. I can’t figure where she gets the energy to do that. Me, I can’t wait to get jilted or yelled at, so I can lie down and take a nap, cause the storm that just came and went is comin back and takin me next time. She just gives you an umbrella and says, “Best stay in the house if you can’t stand getting wet.”

She’s also a forgiver. Me, I can’t say I believe much in forgiven. Something tells me that when someone does something to me, and they done it on purpose, why would I forgive them for that? It ain’t got nothin to do with God, religion, none of that Old Testament stuff, it’s just plain common sense. If you is plannin on robing a bank, and then after you get caught you say, “sorry, didn’t mean it,” you wantin me to believe that, you got another meanin it comin. 

But she says that most people can’t wear another’s shoes, cause they spend too much time worryin about what they look like, how they fit, stuff like that. I tell her what else would you be worryin about. She says, “Ain’t your shoes, what do you care?” I see her point, but grabbin on to stuff like that kind of wrings me the wrong way. She believes everyone would know better than act like that if they was just trained a little better. I just don’t see it.

There are those who go to the finest schools, makin lots of money, and they still steal and lie. How you goin to teach them anything? They thinks they already knows it all. You can’t teach someone with junk stuffed in their ears to hear what you is saying. They get so far removed from the real life, they don’t know what is real and what they made up to be real. 

She can’t see how I can hold a grudge against someone I don’t know. She says I’m a judgin people for what I think they is thinkin and doin and not givin them a chance to explain. I told her, “You think them peoples is goin to listen to me? They can’t even see me. And they can’t see you either. So why waste your time defending people who can’t understand, cause they won’t.”

No, we ain’t ever goin to see things the same. Take this voting business. There are lots of people who think we ain’t smart enough to know who to vote for. They think we are as stupid as they need us to be. We ain’t. I can tell a skunk is comin a long ways for he gets here. 

She is fond of sayin, “To error is human, to forgive is divine.” Fine, get that, but we aren’t dealin with folks who believe in error. No such word in the dictionary for them. They can afford to buy a new book that tells them what they is doin is just fine. They have the brains and the ear of God, what’s to question. I tell you, people who believe they is that clos to God, better watch out for close. I remember the tales from the old book where you can get throwed out of the temple in a New Jersey second, and then get run over by a salt truck, while you is wonderin what happened, and why? 

No sir, when they start that talkin about getting on my high horse, I ain’t askin how high. I’m askin where they is hidin the ladder. 

She says I’m to cynical. I don’t believe in people enough. “Everyone is capable of change.” And that might be, but from where I’m sittin just cause they tell you that, the just will inherit the land, it says so right in the book, I gotta ask what land, and who it belong to? I say, go get your prescription checked, could be your optimism is fogging your ability to know that truths have a way of seeking out other truths, that agree with them.

That’s all I got to think about that. I’ll tell you one last thing for the road. If’n you think tomorrow is goin to be better than yesterday cause of the day before, you got to remember that forgetting the past, ain’t goin to make tomorrow better, it’s only goin to make you wonder, what took you so long to catch on.

And while I’m on the subject, what’s all this about there bein two sides to every story? That may be the case, but I can tell you from experience they can’t both be accurate. Don’t let nobody tell you two wrongs make a right, that ain’t no closer to the truth than tellin me I’m smarter than the average bear. I knowed that already.