Caldron

I've been trying to think of something worthwhile to write for days, but I just can't muster the mental discipline. There's plenty of fodder in the field, just no fire in the belly. In spite of my deep appreciation for the election, there's something gnawing at my elation and I'll be damned if I know what it is. So, I sit in front of the television and listen to Jim Lehrer, letting him think and speak for me.

An exchange with a friend a few days ago described an experience she had that describes, in tone at least, one that I have every now and then: "you wake up happy and it takes you a few minutes to realize your father is dead." I thought I was the only one who had such jarring experiences. When they happen, they knock the wind out of me as sure as a fist to my chest; my world crashes into the edge of the universe and I'm speechless and I can't breathe and everything I've ever known is broken and wrong and ugly and painful and I want the hell out.

It disappears, of course, and all is tolerably well with the world. Tolerably well is not ideal. Sometimes it's not even acceptable.

There's too much that it affects and too many people who stumble unknowingly into the caldron that it creates. Moods cannot redirect rivers and fracture continents and make mountains shatter into rubble. So it's not a mood. Whatever it is, it's not acceptable.