Missing body parts don't stop people with pride and grit. Tammy Duckworth lost both her legs piloting a Blackhawk helicopter in Iraq, but went on the become a U. S. Senator and have a child. Johannes Michalski was a double amputee living in southern Utah who became a well-known painter. And of course, Helen Keller led a fuller life than most people, and she lacked both sight and hearing. So who's to say that a lost large intestine and rectum ought to stop anyone? [I may be gutless but I'm not an asshole.] It would seem, then, that parts previously considered essential were really something you could do without if you set your mind to it. In high school, for instance, my dark curly hair was one of my most attractive features; now I'm bald as a field mushroom, but still have my charms. About eight years ago, I had to have a laparoscopic cholecystectomy to remove my gallbladder. My doctor, a comedian, told me that I wouldn't miss it. “Without it, you will no longer be the kvetch your wife says you are, since you won't be so galling.” So, we get by, we make do with what we have, we adapt. We don't whine; we mellow. We become philosophical. As curmudgeons, we may be churlish, irascible fellows and a trifle cantankerous at times, but we're just as sensitive and soft-hearted as anyone. Despite what we've been through, the pain and the stolen body parts, we don't hate mankind, just mankind's excesses.
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