The Secret Life of Walter Mitty--by James Thurber.

 The Secret Life of Walter Mitty—by James Thurber.

 

The short story deals with a vague and mild-mannered man who drives into Waterbury, Connecticut, with his wife for their regular weekly shopping and his wife's visit to the beauty parlor. During this time, he has five heroic daydream episodes, each inspired by some detail of his mundane surroundings. The first is as a pilot of a U.S. Navy flying boat in a storm, followed by Mrs. Mitty's complaint that Mitty is "driving too fast". As he drives past a hospital, he imagines himself a magnificent surgeon performing a one-of-a-kind surgery. Later, a newsboy shouting about the "Waterbury Trial" begins Mitty's third fantasy, as a deadly assassin testifying in a courtroom. While waiting for his wife, he picks up an old copy of Liberty, reading "Can Germany Conquer the World Through the Air?", and begins his fourth daydream, as a Royal Air Force pilot volunteering for a daring suicide mission to bomb an ammunition dump. As the story ends, Mitty stands against a wall, smoking, and imagines himself facing a firing squad, "inscrutable to the last."

 

Can’t tell you how long it took me to remember the character’s name, but it is ridiculous to know something like that and not be able to put it to words. But just about any of us have this tendency to “see” ourselves as more important, more heroic, and more needed than what we are in reality. Imagination has a place in our lives—for all of us. Sometimes we might just feel that no one is really paying attention to us at all. That may just be why FB and some of the other venues seem so important to some of us. Those numbers surely can’t lie!! But then, we have to look at who really has said that we matter. Can you say it aloud and truly believe it?

 

When we were young, our parents or grandparents made us feel special—well, that is true for many young people but certainly not all youngsters were made to feel that they mattered. Then there were the “special” holidays that pointed out the individuals—Valentine’s Day, Mother’s Day, anniversaries and birthdays. Those have always been a commercial success to point out how special someone is. But when you get right down to it, the special days don’t really make a difference. Yes, we can appreciate being remembered, but it takes something deeper to have true meaning.

 

Someday you will be given a white stone with a new name on it. That name will mean something special to you and to the One who will give it to you. He will tell you that you were special before you were even conceived, before you were ever born! And this One will live with you always, forever! And you will be special and treasured by that One in a way that only you can be—in a way that will have meaning from now on. Do you know now? Do you know the One who loves you now and who will always treasure you?

 

Rest well, my friends. You are loved.