The Hunt Is On..

"Better to be poor and have health, than be rich and have none"

Have you ever come across a more loaded statement than the one above? How many times have you heard somebody say something similar? Nobody wants to be poor in any sense of the word. It is a get-out statement used by those who are not exactly desperately poor, but are not in a position to ever get rich.

There were two things that always immortalized poor for me. Poor Brits invariably had three 'porcelain' Mallard ducks, in loose flight formation, hanging on one wall of their houses, and a picture known as the 'Blue Lady' hanging on another. The 'Blue Lady' had Oriental features, and wore a yellow outfit of the type seen in Japan. Her face was blue, hence the name, and she had quite the most un-Oriental hairdo. The picture was produced by the thousand, and had zero value, material or aesthetic. Rich people prefer the classic oil painting, and in place of the flying ducks, a fine 'real porcelain' or alabaster column atop which sits the 'bust' of Genghis Khan perhaps.

It matters not that all of them were probably produced by some poor, overbearing drunken old faggot, who by virtue of his/her countenance was probably out of work more than he/she were ever in. And on the subject of poor and art, poor old Michelangelo was threatened with death unless he did a darned good job on the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel. The same applied to the great composers of 'classical' music, all of them having to come up with something better for the birthday party of some drunken old Duke who wanted to upstage his rivals.

Somebody once said that the real difference between rich and poor was that being rich enabled one to eat better. How true!! Everybody appreciates a good hearty meal, except for the nitpicking, finicky mob who are invariably the same people who see more merit in the smile of the 'Mona Lisa' than that of the 'Blue Lady'.

We all search for our personal 'Holy Grail'. The question is this. What does it look like? Is it a beautifully handcrafted, jewel encrusted chalice, or is it just a simple wooden drinking vessel? Does it really matter? Surely the promise that it can bring eternal joy, happiness, or whatever is enough. Can a simple wooden drinking vessel ever be worth as much as the beautifully handcrafted, jewel encrusted chalice? Not if owned by you or me perhaps, but were it the one in which some famous movie star kept his/her teeth, then it may be.

What strange values we place on objects, and were it that it was only limited to objects. So very often, it also applies also to our fellow man/woman.