Having been jilted, I was distracting myself with happy things. Then I put them together.
Just keep singing, just keep singing…
PSA: Being dumped unexpectedly may cause paralysis.
“Hence it comes, that Excess of Admiration sometimes induceth a Stupor, or Astonishment… whereby a Man is held stiff, motionless, and senseless, as if he were turned into a statue. For it causeth that all the Animal Spirits in the brain are so vehemently imployed in contemplating and conserving the image of the object, that their usual influx… in other parts of the body is wholly intercepted, nor can they by any means be diverted: whereby all members of the body are held in a rigid posture, inflexible as those of a dead carcas, or of Man killed by Lightning… a memorable Example in a young Man of our Nation, who violently resenting a suddain and unexpected repulse in his love, and astonished thereat, became as it were congeal’d in the same posture, and continued rigid in his whole body till next day.”
Walter Charleton, A Natural History of the Passions (London: 1701). sigs. G5v-G6r.
“Generally we are so much acquainted with our selves and so often do dislike the effect of too much familiarity, that though we cannot alter the inside yet we diversifie the outside with all the borrowed pomp of Art in our Habits” (sig. B9r).
Translation: Those who feel like crap will change their hair/buy new shoes/become obsessed with a new hobby.
The Life and Death of Mrs Mary Frith. Commonly Called Mal Cutpurse. Exactly Collected and now Published for the delight and Recreation of all Merry disposed Persons. London, Printed for W. Gilbertson at the Bible in Giltspur-street without Newgate, 1662.
