What's right about focusing on what went wrong.....

As we all know, the first three years of the strip were a huge downer. We had a few good moments here and there but most of the time, people stood around being pointlessly upset about things and acting needlessly jerkish to one another. It took to 1982 for the artwork to improve, the people to treat each other like people and, well, the continuity we're familiar with to get established. That being said, we still have to explain why Elly has so many negative memories of that period. The non-stop nastiness we saw in the first few years of the strip strains credibility. My guess is that Elly didn't want to remember the good times, that she wanted, for her own reasons, to focus on the things that upset her to feel big and important. You see, she doesn't feel that she's contributing to society at large so she needs to feel like her life was worthwhile. If she can make a beige suburban existence with a cloddish husband and loutish children sound like some horrid catastrophe, she's rescued herself from being irrelevant.