Summary Of Comforting Thoughts By Calvin Trillin

Authenticity is a key aspect of what makes an author legitimate. Calvin Trillin, in Comforting Thoughts, is totally authentic. His story, however, never happened and is just made up. This essay will discuss how Calvin is authentic, if his personal conversations ever took place, and his reasons for writing the story.
Calvin Trillin’s story in entertaining, but it is just a fragment of his imagination. This is evident in many instances throughout his story. One such fragment of evidence would be the conversations he has with himself; those seem to be scripted. For example, Trillin asks himself if the scent of chocolate chip cookies could return to him pleasant childhood memories of his mother’s freshly baked batch. He then asks himself, “What

if his mother always burned the chocolate chip cookies” (334). Calvin returns the remark, “Are you talking about my mother” (334).

Then the ‘other’ Calvin replies, “Whose mother do you think I’m talking about? We’re the only one here” (334). After a more seemingly comical debate, Trillin concludes with a comment for us, “I don’t like to hear anyone make light of my mother’s chocolate chip cookies, even me” (334). As you can see, this debate with himself seems more like it was pre-planned, and written out in a script, rather than something that could actually happen. Why would Trillin try to defeat himself? He is only one person, who has one brain, thus making the ability to attack himself contradictory. Since he is the same person, he could not possibly be one different sides of an authentic argument. It would almost appear as if he were two people. Trillin could not possibly think of himself as two separate people if he were actually there talking to himself. Calvin already would know how to defeat himself, if he could ever even have a dispute. And even so, you could not possibly defeat yourself because you can only legitimately be on one side of an argument. When arguing with yourself, you already know the outcome because it is not a legitimate disagreement. With this in mind, it brings to attention an important aspect of

the story. Not just that his words are scripted, but that he would also need a reason for scripting this one-man dialogue. It would appear that Calvin has hidden a few humorous elements into this confrontation. Which we will explore later, but there is another fragment of evidence that needs to be noticed before we do.
Calvin Trillin is not a superhuman. No normal person could be capable of remembering such meaningless conversations with their self. When people typically remember dialogues is when they have a strong emotional connection to the words. Of course, the words remembered are usually distorted in favor of the one remembering them. So how then did Trillin remember the all the details of the conversations he had that day? It would seem illogical for him to go around his town carrying a notepad writing down everything he said out loud to himself. It makes a lot more sense that he crafted these conversations with the perfect amount of irony peppered here and there in between the sarcasm.
This story was written for the sole propose of entertainment.

In this Calvin Trillin is successful, and quite authentic. It is not the story that matters; not the cookies, the Meriden list, the Yale research, the talking to oneself, or even the comforting thoughts. From a humor standpoint alone Calvin has expressed the true point of this story. His personality truly shows when he uses his ironic, light-hearted style of comedy. He is very consistent, and true to his niche. This is evident when Trillin argues with himself about cookies. Calvin argues, “Are you talking about my mother? Whose mother do you think I’m talking about” (334). This is meant to be funny, because he first asks himself a question, and then he mocks himself in a sarcastic way. He also comments, “I don’t like to hear anyone make light of my mother’s chocolate chip cookies, even me” (334). Now he holds himself in contempt. The whole situation seems outlandish, and that is what he was going for. At the end of the story, he adds his insight to the events of the day, adding light humor there too: “I recalled the time before I knew about the Meriden list, when I talked to myself only in private…Then I felt a lot better. I didn’t feel perfect, but you can’t always feel perfect” (335-336). With his final statement he uses textbook irony. He is saying that in his effort to feel more relaxed, he has completely and utterly stressed himself out. The only way for him to finally find relaxation is to stop talking to

himself altogether. This cancels out all that happened that day, making the reader understand that his story was not about comforting thoughts, it was about Calvin Trillin making us chuckle.
After having found the true purpose of the story, Calvin has made is point clear in the most authentic way he could have. Not only did he perfectly describe his personality and humor, he crafted a purely genuine entertainment piece. Trillin’s jokes will not make you fall out of your chair, but they certainly deserve a slight chuckle.