This Book Could Use a Better Writer

My Vitamin D levels are very low. My thyroid is a bit wonky. Perhaps that is why I feel so little inclination to do anything at all. I have reached a boring patch in the book, the lackluster part you have to slog through – no skipping ahead in this one – before the story picks up again.

Doldrums

Sigh. I am in the doldrums, and not a breath of fresh air to fill my sails. I’m trying to just let depression be what it is, since it is an inescapable part of the rhythm of my life. It won’t be here forever and it can huff and puff but thanks to modern medicine it can’t blow the house down. I hope.

But you know, it’s like having a cold. Yeah you can keep going and you aren’t dangerously ill, but your nose is rubbed raw and your throat hurts, nothing tastes good and you have to breathe through your mouth. It’s annoying, in other words, and gets in the way. Who can create a coherent plan when they’re sneezing and dabbing at their nose all the time? And complaining about it to anyone is about as entertaining as droning on about your cold symptoms.

Still. The symptoms drag at your consciousness all day long. They change the context for your goals and desires. Everything seems an enormous bother.

What is my deepest fear, the one that is always stirring the silt at the bottom of the pond? I think it is to be left alone, with no one, all social connections cut, the loss of every person who has helped define me. The fear of lack of desire. That’s horrible, to find yourself devoid of interest, with only the patterns of duty to keep you moving forward. One of the worst things about depression is the way that pleasure falls away, so that there is no particular reason to do any particular thing, and every decision seems an impossible riddle. I suppose this is why I cultivate my little obsessions, these hooks on which to hang my attention.

Sigh. At least the girls keep me anchored in reality.

A Minor Paradox

This is one of those days when I feel sure trouble is brewing. I must have a terminal illness. My children are being covertly stalked. A financial crisis of some sort is hiding stealthily in the wings. Something monumentally important has been forgotten, and it will be my fault.

Outside the sun is too bright. This is the time of year when crap happens under the unremittingly clear winter light. And all the memories of crap that has happened at this time of year slinks out of their hidey holes to remind me of the insecurity of all we hold dear.

The other night I dreamed that a crab attacked me. You wouldn’t think that a crab could be so menacing, but it kept coming after me. When I woke I first thought it was a very strange thing to dream about – why a crab? Then I thought of the astrological sign featuring a crab – Cancer.

This makes me think of how much I would prefer to not die. Ever. I like being around. If I have to die, I would like it to be of old age, and not after a punishing dose of chemotherapy, like my mom, or in a nasty auto crash, like my nephew.

I’ve got an investment now. I want to see my grandchildren. I want to see all the medical, scientific, and technological advances that the future will bring. It’s been very exciting so far. Every year brings some advance I’m glad I lived to see, or book, film, or song that I can’t believe the world did without.

I don’t find heaven more appealing than here. I’m lucky that heaven is pretty much here on earth for me, and it’s one of my besetting sins that I don’t make it so for others who know nothing of heaven on earth.

So there you have it. On the one hand I’m weary and pessimistic; on the other I rejoice that the world is turning and I’m still here to enjoy the rotation.

Advent

I’ve been reading posts about Advent and wondering how to think about Christmas. I so dislike that little phrase “Jesus is the reason for the season.” If I am completely honest, I would not like Christmas nearly so much if there were not presents and trees, lights and decorations. Although I don’t like the relentless consumerism and marketing of the holidays, I really like many of the secular aspects of Christmas.

I’m not quite sure how to extract Christ from the sentimentalized narrative of events that I’m not sure even happened. Where I work, the thinking is that if the Virgin birth is not true, then Christianity falls apart. I don't know why. The story of a virgin birth really seems like something patched on later to explain how this man could be completely human and divine at the same time. But it’s a beautiful image – the soul of the world waiting for the divine to enter as one of its own, God binding himself in human flesh out of love for his creation, giving himself to his creation. Despite my prevarication, I don’t really feel hypocritical reciting the creed about Jesus being born of a virgin and that he died and rose again. I think so many things are true that aren’t literally true. Good fiction is true. Good poetry is true. And yet there may not be a single actual event in either. They transcend the literal and ascend to a world of – what? – archetypes? Platonic forms? The Christmas story is beautiful. It’s poetry, it may be fiction, it is a vision of what the world could be if we truly followed the law of love, it speaks of our greatest hope that humanity is good, because Jesus was a man and was good, because he championed the outcasts and afflicted, and we ourselves can nurture that goodness.

Dear Husband is frustrated at my lack of passion for Christ, as he puts it. He considers my sense of not fitting in to be of my own making. I do find it very difficult to engage. He loves our new pastor. I find his messages simplistic. Dear Husband thinks I'm antisocial. It's not that I don't think there are other people like me - I just don't think they're at our church. And, yes, I have my guard up based on what I hear people express. My husband fits comfortably into orthodoxy. He doesn't take issue with anything. When I hear our pastor say that doubt must be met with faith, I feel frustrated. It's like saying that hunger must be met with food, and yet the tables are bare. Dear Husband says I didn't really listen. Oh, but I did. I listened, hoping I would hear something startling. I am always hoping I will hear something that will touch me, stir me, invigorate me.

And that is why I am about to turn once again to a more formal style of worship. This next weekend I plan to visit an Episcopal church. I don't necessarily think that I feel completely comfortable there. I have so little experience with this style of worship. I've been to Episcopal/Anglican churches that were sadly out of touch. But I want to experience a little quiet veneration, a different rhythm, the Eucharist as a rite, ritual prayer. Dear Husband is beginning to think I'm a nonbeliever. In many people's opinion, I would be. Not in my own. I just feel tired.