I told you so

I was raised in a culture (described elsewhere) where one heard the phrase "I told you so" fairly often. And then I found myself saying it occasionally. It usually gave next to no satisfaction, and thus remained one of those troublesome, echoing "inner narratives" which can threaten your sanity if not disposed of. I can well remember one of my uncles, or was it an aunt (?), being angry at something stupid I did, which hurt me, and then the somewhat predicable "I told you so" was delivered and I wanted to remind him or her that it was me that got hurt, and I made the mistake, and I paid for it already, thank you.

But they had compounded that by saying the obvious, which was not only insulting but not helpful. My understanding was that uncles and aunts were mentors, people who could back you up when you needed it. & that was usually the case, fortunately. Well, the other day in the face of all the absolutely absurd stuff going in this bewildered world the deadly phrase came out of no where, a ghost in the machine, a survivor for an incredulous past.

Well, it seems that the phase is showing up in the media, probably using other words, but more or less the same meaning. & it almost seems like a version of the apocalyptic, cross wielding christian prophet warning about the absence of a defunct
panacea which has been rendered completely obsolete by the very mentality of the wielder. Ouch, was that I swoosh I felt just over my bewildered head. & as the apocalyptics remind us there isn't much time for fooling around, especially with religious panaceas, as "we struggle toward Jerusalem...."