Season Stressors Need Not Take Toll - By Mark Schurr

The easy-going nature finally embedded in my soul filters out trivial angers and dissipates into patience and relaxation.

Silent rage that once latched onto my mind while fostering pathetic thoughts of hatred has spawned into joy. What am I jabbering about? Impatience seems to breed irritability. The need for immediate satisfaction, for a lot of people, is very aggravating to me.

Too many people want everything right now. You know these types of people? They are numskulls who complain about a crowded airport on the Wednesday before Thanksgiving. They are people who fuss about long lines on Black Friday and meatheads pressed for time, then go to a busy restaurant and demand their server hurry-up.

Dimwits who tail-gate much too close even when you're driving ten miles over the speed limit in the slow lane need to be shot out of a cannon into a brick wall. I slow down a hair under the speed limit so I can laugh at their raging faces in my rear view mirror.

Despite my sense of humor, extreme annoyance festers in my brain every time I encounter erroneous outrage. Certain individuals lack even an ounce of wisdom. It amazes me how uptight some people get, especially this time of year. Christmas is a time to luxuriate in the presence of family and friends. This is certainly not the time of year, nor should any period be spent, to enhance our minds with frivolous fury and unwarranted eagerness.

What is frivolous fury? For starters its people who get mad at an unappreciated and underpaid retail worker because an overpaid Toys R Us manager did not order enough Candy Land games for the Christmas rush.

It’s also lamebrains who give their newspaper delivery person the stink eye for bringing the paper two minutes after 5 a.m.

I worked retail and delivered newspapers. Many customers were ungrateful grown brats. It was amazing to me to witness fully grown adults acting worse than toddlers who didn't get sweets before dinner.

If I'm out and about at 5 a.m., and my local newspaper machine has yesterday’s newspaper in it, I fret for about two milliseconds, then move on with my day. If I meet the newspaper delivery person in the wee hours of the morning, then I say something like, "Hello," or "Good morning," as opposed to, "It's about time," with an invidious leer.

If I'm shopping in mid December, I don't lose my cool because the store is out of various items or cry about long lines. What is wrong with some people?

All I'm suggesting is that we all try and make this a world a place dominated by love and laughter as opposed to one that is saturated with hate, fear and unjustified anger.