Mm. Or you could be pessimistic and call it a contrary streak.

[Just saying. He's no mary sunshine after all: the world is bleak and brutal but things survive there. That's his optimism. And that's on shakier ground than it was.

He shrugs, closing his eyes, his face turned upward.]

Even beaten down so often that it grows wary of raising its head, it seems it doesn't die easily.