On Being Cynical

Are you a cynic? I am. In fact, my cynicism bothers me at times. I worry that Life may be a lot better and Human Beings a lot kinder than I have a habit of crediting. A recent example:

My next door neighbor, a widower who lives alone, recently asked, then asked again a month later, what I planned to do with the huge brush pile at the rear of my property. (To digress, we have many storms here that leave lots of broken limbs.) Answering my neighbor, I said my brother and his friend planned to burn the brush sometime this fall.

Realizing his apparent concern, I said to the neighbor, "Do you have another suggestion?" "Yes," he said. "I'd like to burn it today. The conditions are perfect: recent rains make it easier to work with." I said okay. Thus the work began and ended well a few hours later. My biggest investment? Several trips to deliver ice water to the gentleman and a pan of homemade blueberry muffins later. Polite thanks both ways.

So where's the cynicism? I'm suspicious of his motive. While I'd prefer to think of it as the gesture of a welcoming neighbor, I actually think of it as self-insurance by a man who feared the woman next door, who has a habit of hiring local jobbers for everything, might hire the wrong bunch to burn the brush and wind up causing him a problem. There was at least one hint in that direction, when the fellow noted how the men I'd hired last time had stacked some brush the wrong way and could have caused trouble later. I figure HE figured: "Better do it myself."

Cynical? Realistic? As to another friend's quip that it was good I'd served ice water instead of bourbon, lest fires get lit the wrong way, I said to myself, "Now THERE'S cynicism."

What say you, Gentle Reader? Comments welcomed.