No idea why last night was so terribly rough, but one just doesn't think it can get darker than dark, darker than pitch black, more bottomless than fathomless, and still there is darker and deeper to go down and out. I'm not even sure how I managed to sleep, although Cooder nearby was likely some of it. Yeah, le pays de, rêves fait de désepoir.However, I woke up to find a sunny day and encouragement when I weighed myself so that was worth going downstairs for. On the way to finally get my Honda's recall attended to, I bought more tomatoes from the tomato man and walked 10 minutes uphill to get home. I called my psychopharmacologist to get some refills and arranged to have my car inspected and tuned-up next week, so there ... I am progressing. And to that end, I will return to the kitchen to continue working on my tomato sauce.
But why the darkness at night ... why the terror and despair? Why is my favorite place, bed, (okay, I am fond of the kitchen, too), now nearly loathsome?
And while I am asking questions, why do I write this quotidian chronicle? Not to bore you, of course, but to remind myself I am making some effort, some progress, in the midst of this very very dark wood. As Jackson Browne sang "... and when the morning light comes streaming in/ I'll get up and do it again ..." Maybe I write this as a way of dealing with my relative isolation. I don't know. Some of it is just the discipline of it.
Later, stumbled across this quote on the FB status of a friend.
Great works are performed not by strength but by perseverance.
Samuel Johnson
I wouldn't say my life was a great work, and I'm thinking that perseverance is a critical part of strength, but hanging in there.
The tomatoes are cooking away as well as a new batch of vegetable stock from all the summer's trimmings. This is all making me hungry again.
Started listening to Henry Fielding's Tom Jones as I finished the Barbara Kingsolver, Flight Behavior, which I very much enjoyed. But two more Coursera classes started today and I have to choose which one of them to do as I cannot attend to more than one at a time. One is a modern poetry class that I signed up for about 8 months ago, and the other is Online Gaming: Literature, New Media, and Narrative. That requires me to read Lord of the Rings, which I started about 40 years ago, put down the first volume and never finished. Louise stands by its literary merit, so I have it on disc to listen to next. Tom Jones and the end of Crime and Punishment will just have to wait.
And so to work. Talked to my partners in crime on Monsterwood and have sufficient input to readdress my narrative conundrum.
If you are listening out there, this might be a good time to send a little hello or something this way.
Dear Sally,
ReplyDeleteThe first thought I have is that if you can get your car tuned and your tomatoes bought, then that means you have some money in the bank. If you didnt, then you wouldnt, if you see what I mean.
The perseverance argument has always amused me, because it is a tautology. By definition if someone gives up, then they give up. In most cases, that means end of game and we never hear from them again. In other words, we only hear from those who did not give up.
I think that the solution here is to have a lot of money. Not everyone agrees, but that is my take on the situation.
MW