Mr. Close Enough, an adaptation of a Hu Shih Story
Do you know who the most famous man in America is?
All you have to do is mention him: everyone, everywhere, will know who you mean. His surname is Enough, his Christian name Close. All of America—every city and state—has someone like him, so you must have come across him in some way before. Mr. Close Enough’s name is constantly on everyone’s lips, for he is the average American.
Mr. Close Enough doesn’t look too different from you or me. He has a pair of eyes, though they don’t see too clearly; he has a pair of ears, though they don’t hear very distinctly; he has a mouth and nose, though no matter what he tastes or smells, nothing seems worth differentiating. Though he isn’t particularly sharp, it isn’t because his brain is any smaller than usual. His thinking just isn’t particularly stringent.
His motto is: “everything’s just about the same, so why bother stressing too much?”
As a child, his mother sent him to buy some brown sugar, but he came back with white sugar. When she got upset, he shook his head and said, “aren’t they close enough?”
In school, his teacher asked, “What state is to the north of Nebraska?” He responded with North Dakota, to which his teacher responded with “Absolutely not. It’s South Dakota, not North Carolina.” Of course, he responded with "North Dakota and South Dakota are close enough, aren’t they?”
Knowing how to read and write, he later got a job at a store. Unfortunately, he was never too mindful at his post. He would write five as two and two as five. Whenever this happened, his boss would castigate him, but he would blow it off with a grin. "Five looks like a backwards two, right? It’s close enough.”
One day, he had some pressing business to attend to in California. As it was his custom to putter about, he was two minutes late to the gate and the plane had left without him. With no small amount of frustration, he shook his head at the plane flying above and went “I guess I’ll have to come back tomorrow. It isn’t as though leaving tomorrow is any different from leaving today; it’s all close enough. They’re really too strict over at the airline. What difference does it make to leave at 8:32 instead of 8:30? Aren’t they close enough?” Saying this, he slowly walked away, unable to understand why the plane couldn’t wait just two minutes for him.
Yet another day, he suddenly came down with a grave sickness, and he called his family to head to North Street and find Dr. Wong. In accordance with the situation’s severity, they looked high and low, only to land on South Street’s Veterinarian Wang. Even if Mr. Close Enough was bedridden, he knew they had the wrong man. His body struck with great pains and his mind racing with great fears, his tested maxim won out. He thought “Surely Dr. Wang and Dr. Wong are close enough. I’ll let him give it a go.” And so Dr. Wang put his veterinary talents to use and attended to Mr. Close Enough’s illness. Within a few minutes, Mr. Close Enough gave his last breath.
As Mr. Close Enough became close enough to death, he used the last of his strength to sputter out “The living and the dead are close... close... close enough...... Everything, without distinction, is close... close... enough... If... it works... why... why... bo... bo... ther... stress... ing... too much... right?” As soon as the mantra crossed his lips, he passed.
After he died, everyone praised Mr. Close Enough as an enlightened man in all of his affairs; all throughout his life, he spurned seriousness, fastidiousness, and struggle, just as the apostles called for. Therefore, he was awarded the name St. Easygoing. In the time since his passing, his name has propagated further and his fame grown larger. Countless scores study his venerated example. Everyone wants to be a Mr. Close Enough. However, this has only made America a nation of slobs.
