David Foster Wallace, the author of This is Water, uses “didactic little parable-ish stories” to convey his main message about staying self aware of the world that is around us. His examples are different and unique because each scenario has to do with people in different stages and situations in their lives. These situations are also similar in the fact that it’s hard in those situations to realize what could be going on in the lives of others around us. Staying aware of others is what he wants us to consume from all of his stories because being aware will help us in the grand scheme of things. This is Water tells us to stay more aware of our surroundings by using different examples of people, showing the backstory of each situation, and reminding us to stay conscious. 

The first “parable-ish” stories is about two young fish swimming and as they are swimming run into an older fish who asks the younger fish “How’s the water?” The younger fish aren’t aware of water the water is. I call these “parable-ish” stories because towards the end of the story Wallace talks about worship and uses other religious terms such as sinful. In this first story Wallace is trying to get a point across that the most obvious realities are most times the hardest to see. This ties into self-awareness in our life. Becoming self aware of what is going on around us can be the hardest thing to do most of the time. We never dig deep and look into the possibilities of what can be going on in other people’s lives. Most of the time we just look on top and see the surface of the situation. I know that I would want people to blow off my background in a situation where there might be a touchy subject. Are we really trying to be aware of our surroundings and what could actually be going on around us? 

Wallace then gives us another “parable-ish” story about two men at a bar in remote Alaska. One of the men is an atheist while the other is a religious man. They have an argument abut the existence of God. The atheistic man told the religious man that he has tried the “God and prayer thing.” God just never answered back in the way the atheistic man wanted Him to. Wallace’s point in this story is that the religious man and the atheistic man are similar in that they have “blind certainty.” Nobody knows either of the men’s backgrounds besides them and we have to realize that. The non-religious man could have had a traumatic moment in his life where he tried being spiritual and God never answered back like he wanted him to. The religious man doesn’t know his story but he won’t take the time to try and realize what the situation could be. Same goes for the non-religious man, he doesn’t know why the other man is religious. He just thinks it’s dumb and pointless. Wallace wants us to become less arrogant and to become more self aware of the certainties of life. 

In Wallace’s third “parable-ish” story he uses an example of an average adult day. A person works for eight or ten hours a day and then becomes tired. They want to go home and get an early sleep because they have to repeat the same exact workday tomorrow. They then realize they have no food at home so they have to go to the super market, which is lit at this point in the day. They become frustrated with their situation and the people around them. There is nowhere for them to take their frustration out because everyone else that is there is frustrated as well. Everyone and everything around them is negative, from the store to the clerk to the traffic once they leave. What Wallace wants us to see through this story is we don’t know the situations everyone else is in. He lists examples of all the different situations people could be in and how the situations could be affecting the way people act. The point once again is that we need to become more self aware of our surroundings because you never know what could be going on in other people’s lives. Staying conscious of the world that’s around us is a very difficult task and it takes work to accomplish it. 

Wallace wants us to have a realization that all things in life aren’t just what’s on the surface. There are back-stories to everything and every person. If we become more self-aware we can realize why people might be like they are. Wallace uses “didactic little parable-ish stories” to convey his main message about staying self aware of the world that is around us. This is Water tells us to stay more aware of our surroundings by using different examples of people, showing the backstory of each situation, and reminding us to stay conscious. Once we become more self-aware we won’t get irritated as easily with the world around us. 
