picture in my mind

I loooove mendaki. Today, my chest felt it was full to bursting with happiness, because mendaki was nice and deigned to help us. Why can't there be more nice people in this world, the likes of Kak Z? I realise I have been not-grateful-enough to mendaki thus far. Not only do they provide me money every year, but they also empathise with the difficulties of pentasbudaya. Ah yes. The sun is shining a little bit on us. Although... some other things are still falling apart.

Times like these require that grim courage Allan Massie was talking about.

There are two kinds of courage, my Prince. There is the courage which flares up in moments of danger, the courage which appears without reflection, as a mere natural response to the urgency of the moment. Though I say 'a mere natural response', you must not think that I wish to diminish this sort of courage, for many men lack it and the man who is brave in the hour of peril is justly admired.

But the other sort of courage is still more rare. This is a cold courage which allows a man to look reality in the face, to contemplate adversity and not be daunted. It is a dour level-headed sort of courage, that enables a man to hang on by his teeth when all around him crumbles. And this courage, too, Arthur possessed.

I was such in a good mood on the way back home. Was grinning and reading OotP in the bus. And it suddenly hit me if this was how bubbly, cheerful personalities felt all their lives. How lucky they are, if such people do exist.