A few days ago as I was walking along a street, I could see two men in work-clothes standing on the sidewalk facing the side of a parked red truck. As I continued walking in their direction, I noticed their eyes never left the truck. They looked lost in thought when viewed from a block away, not in an unusual way, but rather like a Norman Rockwell scene. As I reached the truck, I saw they were focused on a painting that was leaning against the truck. No one else was around, perhaps they’d just bought the painting, or been given the painting. From the way they were looking at it, obviously trying to make some sense of it, it was hard to guess how it got into their possession. As I passed them, I heard one of the men say of the painting, “It is what it is.” The other man had no response. I glanced at the painting in passing. Had I lingered along with them, I would have been in their same puzzled state, staring and saying, “Yes, it is what it is.” And that was a good description of what it was. People used to say “interesting” for want of a better word, but “It is what it is” does nicely, too.
I’ve been hearing that phrase a lot lately, that, or “It is as it is.” There’s a feeling of acceptance when you hear the words, and they’re often said with a kind of gentleness, too. Whatever it is about those words, they seem to work for all occasions.