Working Up

by Dwayne Phillips

Things are the way they are. But why? An old saying explains much of the reason.

There is an old but little known saying, “Things are the way they are because they got that way.”

Pause to consider. Yes, of course the saying is correct. We are here because everything and everyone who passed through here influenced the situation and made it what it is today.

But, but, but… no buts. Of course the ways of the greater world out there influenced things. There was the election of whatever election we wish to blame. There was the heat wave or cold spell of whenever the year was we wish to blame. We had no control over inflation and we certainly had no control over the pandemic, we just had to go along and we cannot be held responsible.

I suppose the last statement is the big point of all this. Surely we can find someone else to blame for why we have the bad situation we have. If not someone else, some thing else is to blame. We just cannot take the blame on ourselves. After all, we were here, and … and there we have it. We were here then and we did the things that caused us to be here now. If we weren’t here then, we joined at some point, and here we are.

Rats. Surely there is something else to all this. Perhaps not. Perhaps we should simply do better—all of us.