If This Isn't Nice, What Is?

"My late Uncle Alex Vonnegut, my father’s kid brother, a Harvard-educated life insurance agent in Indianapolis who was well read and wise, was a humanist like all the rest of the family. What Uncle Alex found particularly objectionable about human beings in general was that they so seldom noticed it when they were happy.

He himself did his best to acknowledge it when times were sweet. We could be drinking lemonade in the shade of an apple tree in the summertime, and Uncle Alex would interrupt the conversation to say, “If this isn’t nice, what is?”

I myself say that out loud at times of easy, natural bliss: “If this isn’t nice, what is?” Perhaps others can also make use of that heirloom from Uncle Alex. I find it really cheers me up to keep score out loud that way."

--Kurt Vonnegut

I say "If this isn't nice, what is?" quite a lot to honor, Mr. Vonnegut, my favorite author and maybe my favorite human being. And then I almost always add, "God bless you Kurt and Uncle Alex wherever you are. I hope it's nice." It's a ritual I have, and if no one else is around, I say it to the cat or the dog. Who gives a shit? The main thing is to say it and thereby to recognize happiness. It's American Zen.