Pliny the Elder must have liked The Bluebird of Happiness. He hums it all the time. Just remember this, Life is no abyss da de da de dee etceteraah! Why do you like it so much? I asked him.
Because, he replied, the bluebird represents love and joy, all that is cheerful, happy and good.
Ah Pliny, I said, I cannot share your delight in these things. The song drives me nuts and the words are too banal. And there is something else....
Tell me, said Pliny in an unusually kindly voice.
Well, I said, when my sisters and I were young we went on a family holiday with our parents to Lorne on the coast of Victoria. I was about 14 at the time, and Wendy was 7 and Susan was just a baby. It was a long drive, and we had been travelling all morning and half the afternoon. We girls were sitting in the back seat. Wendy was playing with her favourite toy of the moment, a tiny blue plastic swan from a breakfast cereal packet. She called it Swanny River, and she was talking to it and pretending it was talking back.
Whether I was trying to read a book I don't remember, but she was getting on my nerves. I kept telling her to shut up. She wouldn't. Mum and dad weren't paying any attention. Suddenly I did a most uncharacteristic thing. I opened the window, grabbed Swanny River and threw him a far as I could into the scrubby bushes at the side of the road. Shock and horror! No one could believe I had done it including me. I had thrown away my little sister's blue bird of happiness. Dad stopped the car and went back but of course we never found it.
Alas! said Pliny. And did you apologise to your sister?
No, I said, but I intend to one day.
Pliny looked wise. Just remember this, he began, and started to hum his favourite song.
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