Mary Schmich wants the audience to remember most is that people are blinded by what other have that they can't see what they have. This creates the illusion that the privileges we have are really just standard necessities.The purpose of the column is to make the readers reflect on their own situations and lives and think about current events and how others are losing more than they ever would. It also makes the reader reflect on the defintion of value and how we get in the situations we're in. Like why does this person have more than me and is it something I can control.
The author often uses diction to almost exaggerate situations and show that no matter how bad things are they could be worse. Like when Schmich says how her sister, with a mental illness "literally trembles with medicine and the fluctuations of a troubled mind" (23). This situation sounds pretty hard and the struggled is emphasized with the hyperbole "Trembles with medicine". But then the author continues to show that someone else has it worse.
This column makes you wonder what it means to have truly nothing. It also shows society that the value of something is in the eyes of the beholder. Cause a man can lose his family in an earthquake but and to him, he has nothing, but it's still better than those who are dead. But maybe that man would rather die than live without his family. People make things valuable. Gold be worth anything if no one wanted it. Our generation is known as the ME-generation or the selfish generation. This article could be targeted to those consumed with those who have more and need to be more grateful. Overall this column shows us we need to look through the perspective and that jealously is inevitable because we all value somethings more than other.
