I pass on, without regard for logic or completeness, to a
personality type that we may call the anhedonic or simpler a
restless, not easily satisfied, easily disgusted group. Some of
these are cyclothymic, over-emotional, often monothymic but I am
discussing them from the standpoint of their satisfaction with
life and its experiences. The ordinary label of "finicky" well
expresses the type, but of course it neglects the basic
psychology. This I have discussed elsewhere in this book and will
here describe two cases, one a congenital type and the other
acquired.
T. was born dissatisfied, so his mother avers. As a baby he was
"a difficult feeding case" because the very slightest cause, the
least change in the milk, upset him, a fact attested to by
vigorous crying. Babies have a variability in desire and
satisfaction quite as much as their elders.
Apparently T. thrived, despite his start, for as a child he was
sturdy looking. Nevertheless, in toys, games, treats, etc., he
was hard to please and easy to displease. He turned up his nose
if a toy were not perfection, and he had to have his food
prepared according to specification or his appetite vanished.
Moreover, he had a very limited range of things he liked, and as
time went on he extended that list but little. He was very choice
in his clothes--not at all a regular boy--and quite disgusted
with dirt and disorder. "A little old maid" somebody called him,
having in mind of course the traditional maiden lady.
As T. grew his capacity for pleasure-feeling did not increase. On
the contrary his attention to the details necessary for his
pleasure made of him one of those finicky connoisseurs who,
though never really pleased with anything, get a sort of pleasure
in pointing out the crudity of other people's tastes and
pleasures. This attitude of superiority is the one compensation
the finicky have, and since they are often fluent of speech and
tend to write and lecture, they impose their notions of good and
bad upon others, who seek to escape being "common." In T.'s case
his attitude toward food, clothes, companions, sports and work
created a tense disharmony in his family, and one of his brothers
labeled him "The Kill-joy." Secretly envious of other people's
simple enjoyment, T. made strenuous efforts at times to overcome
his repugnances and to enlarge the scope of his pleasures, but
because this forfeited for him the superiority he had reached as
a very "refined" person, he never persisted in this process.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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