Did I Ever Tell You How Lucky You Are?

Since the last post I'm discussing about Dr. Seuss' story adaptation, I might as well share my another favorite story of Dr. Seuss. This is a story about being thankful for who you are.

Did I Ever Tell You How Lucky You Are?

 

(i do not own this video. the video credit belongs to random house home video)

When I was quite young
and quite small for my size,
I met an old man in the desert of Drize.
And he sang me a song I will never forget.
At least, well, I haven’t forgotten it yet.
He sat in a terribly prickly place.
But he sang with a sunny sweet smile on his face.

When you think things are bad,
when you feel sour and blue,
when you start to get mad…
you should do what I do!

Just tell yourself, Duckie,
you’re really quite lucky!
Some people are much more…
oh, ever so much more…
oh, muchly much-much more
unlucky than you!

Be glad you don’t work on the Bunglebung Bridge
that they’re building across Boober Bay at Bumm Ridge.
It’s a troublesome world. All the people who’re in it
are troubled with troubles almost every minute.
You ought to be thankful, a whole heaping lot,
for the places and people you’re lucky you’re not!

Just suppose for example,
you lived in Ga-Zayt
and got caught in the traffic
on Zaty Highway Eight!

Or suppose,
just for instance,
you lived in Ga-Zair
with your bedroom up here
and your bathroom up THERE!

Suppose, just suppose, you were poor Herbie Hart,
who has taken his Throm-dim-bu-lator apart!
He never will get it together, I’m sure.
He never will know if the Gick or the Goor
fits into the Skrux or the Snux or the Snoor.
Yes, Duckie, you’re lucky you’re not Herbie Hart
who has taken his Throm-dim-bu-lator apart!

Think they work you too hard…?
Think of poor Ali Sard!
He has to mow grass in his uncle’s back yard
and it’s quick-growing grass
and it grows as he mows it.
The faster he mows it, the faster he grows it.
And all that his stingy old uncle will pay
for his shoving that mower around in the hay
is the piffulous pay of two Dooklas a day.
And Ali can’t live on such piffulous pay!

SO…
He has to paint flagpoles
on Sundays in Grooz.
How lucky you are
you don’t live in his shoes!

And poor Mr. Bix!
Every morning at six,
poor Mr. Bix has his Borfin to fix!
It doesn’t seem fair. It just doesn’t seem right,
but his Borfin just seems to go shlump every night.
It shlumps in a heap, sadly needing repair.
Bix figures it’s due to the local night air.

It takes him all day to un-shlump it.
And then…
the night air comes back
and it shlumps once again!

So don’t you feel blue. Don’t get down in the dumps.
You’re lucky you don’t have a Borfin with shlumps.

And, while we are at it, consider the Schlottz,
the Crumple-horn, Web-footed, Green-bearded Schlottz,
whose tail is entailed with un-solvable knots.
If he isn’t muchly
more worse off than you,
I’ll eat my umbrella.
That’s just what I’ll do.

And you’re lucky, indeed, you don’t ride a camel.
To ride on a camel, you sit on a wamel.
A wamel, you know, is a sort of a saddle
held on by a button that’s known as a faddle.
And, boy! If your old wamel-faddle gets loose,
I’m telling you, Duckie, you’re gone like a goose.

And poor Mr. Potter,
T-crosser,
I-dotter.
He has to cross t’s
and he has to dot i’s
in an I-and-T factory
out in Van Nuys!

Oh, the jobs people work at!
Out west, near Hawtch-Hawtch,
there’s a Hawtch-Hawtcher Bee-Watcher.
His job is to watch…
is to keep both his eyes on the lazy town bee.
A bee that is watched will work harder, you see.

Well…he watched and he watched.
But, in spite of his watch,
that bee didn’t work any harder. Not Mawtch.

So somebody said,
“Our old-bee-watching man
just isn’t bee-watching as hard as he can.
He ought to be watched by another Hawtch-Hawtcher!
The thing that we need
is a Bee-Watcher-Watcher!”

WELL…

The Bee-Watcher-Watcher watched the Bee-Watcher.
He didn’t watch well. So another Hawtch-Hawtcher
had to come in as a Watch-Watcher-Watcher!
And today all the Hawtchers who live in Hawtch-Hawtch
are watching on Watch-Watcher-Watchering-Watch,
Watch-Watching the Watcher who’s watching the bee.
You’re not a Hawtch-Watcher. You’re lucky, you see!

And how fortunate you’re not Professor de Breeze
who has spent the past thirty-two years, if you please,
Trying to teach Irish ducks how to read Jivvanese.

And think of the
poor puffing Poogle-Horn Players,
who have to parade
down the Poogle-Horn Stairs
every morning to wake up
the Prince of Poo-Boken.
It’s awful how often
their poogles get broken!

And, oh! Just suppose
you were poor Harry Haddow.
Try as he will
he can’t make any shadow!
He thinks that, perhaps, something’s wrong with his Gizz.
And I think that, by golly, there probably is.

And the Brothers Ba-zoo.
The poor Brothers Ba-zoo!
Suppose your hair grew
like theirs happened to do!

You think your unlucky…?
I’m telling you, Duckie,
some people are muchly,
oh, ever so muchly,
muchly more-more-more unlucky than you!

And suppose that you lived in that forest in France,
where the average young person just hasn’t a chance
to escape from the perilous pants-eating-plants!
But your pants are safe! you’re a fortunate guy.
And you ought to be shouting, “How lucky am I!”

And , speaking of plants,
you should be greatly glad-ish
you’re not Farmer Falkenberg’s
seventeenth radish.

And you’re so, so lucky
you’re not Gucky Gown,
who lives by himself
ninety miles out of town,
in the Ruins of Ronk.
Ronk is rather run-down.

And you’re so, so, So lucky
you’re not a left sock,
left behind by mistake
in the Kaverns of Krock!

Thank goodness for all of the things you are not!
Thank goodness you’re not something someone forgot,
and left all alone in some punkerish place
like a rusty tin coat hanger handing in space.

That’s why I say, “Duckie!
Don’t grumble! Don’t stew!
Some critters are much-much,
oh, ever so much-much,
so muchly much-much more unlucky than you!”
—Dr. Seus