When I sit down to write a column I'm cognizant of the fact that if I do not somehow make my thoughts interesting to a wide range of people, whatever I write won't be read.

Perfidious readers.

You have the choice to glance around a newspaper and read a headline or start reading an article and glance off to something else.

It's your choice, and I will never know whether you liked my column or not. I often wish people would take the time to comment more, but that is probably my ego talking here.

Hey, you are busy, too.

There is evidence some of you out there read my column as people come forward now and then. Whenever it happens it is such a plus to my day.

We writers know you get one go at the audience, and the next day the column is wrapped around fish at the market.

It's when a story hits a nerve that people write in, but I don't like hitting nerves. Really I do try to think about all of you out there and try to either lighten your spirits or inform you.

Two weeks ago I wrote a column about the healing power of laughter in which I mentioned A.S. (officially known as ankylosing spondylitis). It is a chronic and painful inflammatory arthritis that among other things can cause fusion of the spine.

Some A.S. sufferers were quite incensed that Norman Cousins, the man who claimed to laugh himself well, continues to be the poster child for the disease because the reality is that medical intervention is necessary — not just laughter.

The flip side is many more people are aware of the disease because of Norman Cousins, including me.

One gentleman who called himself "Happy Valley Spondy" commented: "Well, I will say that this article made me laugh quite a bit … at the author. Laughed so hard my hips and back hurt. Oh dang, I guess that means I still have A.S. My wife will be very sad to learn that A.S. is fatal. That was news to me as well."

The laugh's on me.

Obviously I wasn't aware of the Spondylitis Association of America Web site any more than I was aware there was such a disease.

I appreciate that so many took the time to write in and help me learn.

Howard Zinn wrote an article titled "The Optimism of Uncertainty." In it he says this: " To be hopeful in bad times is not just foolishly romantic. It is based on the fact that human history is a history not only of cruelty, but also of compassion, sacrifice, courage, kindness. … And if we do act, in however small a way, we don't have to wait for some grand utopian future. The future is an infinite succession of presents, and to live now as we think human beings should live, in defiance of all that is bad around us, is itself a marvelous victory."

And so my hope as a writer is simple. I hope someone will like what I write and respond, even if it's to put down the paper and have a more positive day because of what they read.

E-mail: sasyoung2@aol.com