Don't Grunt

Here's another couple of old postcards from our always-growing collection, both from 1906, and both postally used: this kind of century-old wisdom always seems best, don't you think? It has both a kind of early-twentieth-century folksiness and all the dignity of great age to give it a kind of gravitas, I suppose.

These were both originally copyrighted by M. T. Sheahan, from Boston, Mass; each card reads, above the space for the address, "Sheahan's Good Mottos make the world brighter." It's hard to disagree: the brilliant carmine ink on the "Don't Grunt" card looks brand new, though the other card is showing its age a bit. If you ask me, the dancing pig is an especially nice touch.

We bought these at completely different times and places, probably for about a dollar each: that's generally our limit on silly postcards. What's remarkable is that for a dollar we can still find something like this that can make us smile: it's a dollar well spent, I say.

Here and now, during finals week, I'm trying to take the messages to heart. I have a real tendency to grunt, I'm afraid, but for the time being at least, I'm going to try to concentrate on doing my stunt.

We'll see where that gets me. If it doesn't get me too far, I can always forget it. But I'm probably more likely to go back to grunting.