Lanterns & Lances

“Don’t you think that things are getting better?” a woman asked me not long ago at a party.“Madam,” I replied, in my courtly, but slightly edged fashion, “things will take care of themselves. What I am interested in is people.”By people she thought that I meant persons, and she began rattling off facts and figures about sundry marriages and divorces of Hollywood celebrities and total strangers. In this dreary field of vital statistics I am not at home, and I began throwing forward passes wildly, about the state of the Union, world affairs, and a few recent books. As usually happens when I encounter ladies at parties, this got me nowhere. “I have reason to believe,” said my companion, “that my fourteen-year-old daughter has a bottle of vodka hidden somewhere in the house.”I didn’t know what to say to that, so I didn’t say anything, which is rather unusual for me at a party. She looked at me sharply. “You’re much too serious nowadays,” she said. “What has made you so lubugrious all of a sudden?”