Good qualities

The way the room reacts when he walks in.
The way she gracefully handles a situation.
The way they have a huge capacity to bear 
so much of stupidity. The list goes on of
the good qualities in the people around. 
I try to apply the old parental maxim: 
don't be foolish, learn from others, and 
I am soon the Frankenstein's monster walking
around, front loaded with good qualities. 
But I often get a suggestion now, 
from friends and well wishers: Be yourself. 
I have a suspicion, they are only telling me 
not to be this monster of unbearable agreeability. 
They are secretly praying for me 
to know my imperfections. 

Mistakes maketh a man, the old saying goes
and the whole world is now chorusing it to me. 
The foolishness must not be set aside. 
It is to be worn as a symbol of existence. 
Even I tend to support the right to be foolish 
and maintain that it is the right from which 
spoke out all other rights. And it is 
the only right over which we often hover 
for comfort and meaning.