If This Isn't Nice, I Don't Know What Is

Hi friends,

The great American writer Kurt Vonnegut had an uncle, Alex, who was a Harvard-educated life insurance salesman and a well-read man. In Vonnegut’s view, he was “better” at living than almost anyone else he knew.

Maybe that’s because Alex was an observer. Specifically, he was one to notice what was happening around him, especially what was going well. For example, when he was out on a nice day, sitting under a tree with a glass of lemonade, listening to bees in the flowers, he’d stop the conversation and remind himself of how good he had it.

Vonnegut wrote later that many people don’t do this. It’s easier for us to notice trouble, or what isn’t going too well. Though Vonnegut died in 2007, that is just as true today.

So the saying is worth considering for our own lives. A “good life” can come on a random mid-day walk on a Tuesday afternoon, or with a delicious sandwich at the local deli, or via a phone call with an old friend. If you’re waiting for it to look bigger than that, Vonnegut noted, you’ll probably miss most of the “good life.”

Vonnegut took the habit and passed it on, most famously in a commencement speech, telling graduates to try Uncle Alex’s trick for themselves.

“One of the things [Uncle Alex] found objectionable about human beings was that they so rarely noticed it when they were happy,” Vonnegut wrote. “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?’

So I hope that you will do the same for the rest of your lives. When things are going sweetly and peacefully, please pause a moment, and then say out loud, ‘If this isn’t nice, what is?’”

On a related note, I love how Vonnegut ended one of his graduation speeches. While speaking to the women of the graduating class at Agnes Scott College in Decatur, Georgia, he ended his talk with a fun exercise:

That’s one favor I’ve asked of you. Now I ask for another one. I ask it not only of the graduates, but of everyone here, parents and teachers as well. I’ll want a show of hands after I ask this question.

How many of you have had a teacher at any level of your education who made you more excited to be alive, prouder to be alive, than you had previously believed possible?

Hold up your hands, please.

Now take down your hands and say the name of that teacher to someone else and tell them what that teacher did for you.

All done?

If this isn’t nice, what is?

This is the same Vonnegut who is known for something he supposedly said at a party. He believed that too many people spend a lifetime chasing money and big homes and belongings, while true inner peace could have been theirs the whole time. As the story goes:

One summer evening, Vonnegut and his pal Joseph Heller were at a party thrown by a business titan, who collected art as well as literary guests.

Vonnegut took a poke at Heller: “Joe, how does it make you feel to know that our host only yesterday may have made more money than your novel ‘Catch-22’ has earned in its entire history?”

Heller replied, “I’ve got something he can never have. The knowledge that I’ve got enough.”

Heller had already figured out what Uncle Alex was trying to teach. He didn’t need a bigger number in the bank to know he’d arrived. He just needed to notice that he had.

So next time you catch yourself doing fine, drinking your lemonade in the shade, ask the question both men were really asking.

If this isn’t nice, what is?

Celebrate your life,

Matthew