A new project

I had forgotten in the last ten years of fighting it, how good it felt to give in.

The sheer relief of just not being that interested in the world that not eating gives one. The feeling of detachment and liberty. It isn't my problem. I'm not participating in any of this.

I have no part in life and life has no claims on me.

Surprised too how easy it has been to go back to it. How much of the moment to moment mental discipline is still there, like the skill of driving.

And how much of it is really a matter of conscious choice. It is a pure exercise of the will, to overcome temptation each and every time. To be in control, to regulate minutely how much one eats, is really a thrill. To say, "No. Not now. Not for another six hours." or "No more today."

It's early days yet, but I feel liberated. Nothing much matters.

It's not euphoria, just relief. And no depression. None. It's over as long as I can maintain this physical detachment.

Where to next?

Doesn't seem to matter much, actually.

Uncle

This morning I whispered back to the Whisperer. Standing in front of the mirror, I told it that I give. I give. I give.

Uncle.

It has been telling me so long what the solution is, there just seems no arguing with it any more.

I have brought down the chopper on K. I had swallowed everything that I could get down and it was enough.

It is enough.

"The sorrow of the world worketh death."

I suppose I am not the only one thinking about depression outside the psychological box. The phenomenon of depression, "melancholia", has been noted by writers in the west for centuries.

The Catholic thinkers in the Middle Ages called it Acedia and Tristitia (sadness).

John Zmirak writes today on Inside Catholic:

St. Thomas Aquinas warns that Accedia, unacknowledged and unanswered, is a sure road to despair and can lead even to suicide. It rarely urges us to sin, even by omission, but rather allows us to slog through our daily duties, jaundiced by a sickly tint of dismay and even disgust. Pleasures can start to weary us, and the prospect of Heaven seem not so much unattainable as irrelevant.

Sounds depressingly familiar, doesn't it?

Thomas Aquinas said:

Sloth, according to Damascene ... is an oppressive sorrow, which, to wit, so weighs upon man's mind, that he wants to do nothing; thus acid things are also cold. Hence sloth implies a certain weariness of [spiritual] work, as appears from a gloss on Psalm 106:18, "Their soul abhorred all manner of meat," and from the definition of some who say that sloth is a "sluggishness of the mind which neglects to begin good."

Thomas further answers the objections that Acedia is not a sin, saying when it is indulged, it is the sin of ingratitude, at least:

It is a sign of humility if a man does not think too much of himself, through observing his own faults; but if a man contemns the good things he has received from God, this, far from being a proof of humility, shows him to be ungrateful and from such like contempt results sloth, because we sorrow for things that we reckon evil and worthless.

He even recommends a cure:

by resistance, when perseverance in the thought diminishes the incentive to sin, which incentive arises from some trivial consideration. This is the case with sloth, because the more we think about spiritual goods, the more pleasing they become to us, and forthwith sloth dies away.

The Desert Fathers, those pioneers and spiritual alpinists, warned that Acedia is particularly the downfall of solitaries.

John Cassian wrote about it, calling acedia a "tedium or perturbation of heart ... akin to dejection and especially felt by wandering monks and solitaries, a persistent and obnoxious enemy to such as dwell in the desert."

He goes on:

When this [acedia] besieges the unhappy mind, it begets aversion from the place, boredom with one's cell, and scorn and contempt for one's brethren, whether they be dwelling with one or some way off, as careless and unspiritual-minded persons.

Well, I'm pretty solitary, I suppose.

Amma Theodora said:

You should realize that as soon as you intend to live in peace, at once evil comes and weighs down your soul through acedia, faint-heartedness, and evil thoughts. It also attacks your body through sickness, debility, weakening of the knees, and all the members. It dissipates the strength of soul and body. ... But if we are vigilant, all the temptations fall away.

Vigilance.

Others suggest, essentially, keeping busy. But these are monastics and their advice is for the problems of novices in keeping to strict routines of prayer, fasting and spiritual exercises. Keeping busy with praying all night and making rush baskets by day isn't going to be very helpful now.

But it certainly is true that for years, a large part of my suppressed fury (which is what the Head People say depression is) has been at God. I have done my share, I'll freely admit, and so have others. But the basic facts of my life, the founding situation, was God's alone. And it is that one thing that I look upon as the insurmountable wall, the thing that makes every effort look futile.

Thomas warns that the effect of Acedia is to make one hate holy things, and have an aversion to the spiritual goods of religion.

He quotes Gregory the Great who assigned "six daughters" to Acedia, "malice, spite, faint-heartedness, despair, sluggishness in regard to the commandments, wandering of the mind after unlawful things."

Thoomas argues against Cassian and the earlier writers that it is not merely a condition of the soul, but a vice and if acted upon a sin. And depending upon the circumstances, mortal:

mortal sin is so called because it destroys the spiritual life which is the effect of charity, whereby God dwells in us. Wherefore any sin which by its very nature is contrary to charity is a mortal sin by reason of its genus.

It "is opposed to the precept about hallowing the Sabbath day. For this precept, in so far as it is a moral precept, implicitly commands the mind to rest in God: and sorrow of the mind about the Divine good is contrary thereto."

Acedia, then, is spiritual depression and it results in the hatred of holiness and the extinguishing of joy.

For some reason, Puddleglum's great profession of Faith has suddenly come into my mind.

In a dark place, where there was little hope of seeing daylight again, this good melancholic servant of Aslan said to the devil in a witch's body:

"One word, Ma'am," he said, coming back from the fire; limping, because of the pain. "One word... All you've been saying is quite right, I shouldn't wonder... Suppose we have only dreamed, or made up, all those things-trees and grass and sun and moon and stars and Aslan himself. Suppose we have. Then all I can say is that, in that case, the made-up things seem a good deal more important than the real ones.

Suppose this black pit of a kingdom of yours is the only world. Well, it strikes me as a pretty poor one. And that's a funny thing, when you come to think of it. We're just babies making up a game, if you're right. But four babies playing a game can make a play-world which licks your real world hollow. That's why I'm going to stand by the play world. I'm on Aslan's side even if there isn't any Aslan to lead it. I'm going to live as like a Narnian as I can even if there isn't any Narnia. So, thanking you kindly for our supper, if these two gentlemen and the young lady are ready, we're leaving your court at once and setting out in the dark to spend our lives looking for Overland. Not that our lives will be very long, I should think; but that's a small loss if the world's as dull a place as you say."

Time

I've been thinking about time and how strange it is.

I just had a message on Facebook from a friend, B, whom I knew in elementary school. Sixth grade. There were two 6th g. classes at our school and she was in the other one. She was really the first real friend I made at school, and we stayed friends until well into our twenties. Then the usual things happened. She got married and I moved to the mainland. But we never lost touch until I had my big conversion in my thirties.

I had moved to Halifax (sort of by accident, really, though come to think of it, it seems odd to move 3500 miles unintentionally) and one day was sitting in my cafe reading Mclean's magazine. Her father, R, was well known and I saw a picture of him in the obits column. I had known he wasn't well, but I didn't think we had expected him to die. I jumped up and used the payphone to call my friend, forgetting the three hour time difference.

About a year after that, I heard from someone else (another character from my youth who is since lost in the crowd of the deep past) that her mother, S, had died. This was a blow to me, since S and R had taken care of me when I left home and was alone in my mid-teens. I had lived with them in their big generous house and owed much of my survival and sanity to them.

But after that, B and I more or less lost touch. I had assumed that her interest in me, as it had been for most people I had known Before, would have more or less disappeared. I no longer lived in their world, and had little in common with most of them, so complete had my change been.

But B had always had a very generous nature, and her graciousness had always been the leading feature of her character. As it is with the small number of other pre-conversion friends I had kept. Ideological and religious differences sometimes don't matter if love is strong enough.

Sometimes time is enough to make the tree too big to kill.

I was thinking about death today too, and how it is related to time. In the last five years, two of the more important figures in my life have died, both of cancer, and one of the worst parts of this is that time is taking me further and further away from them. When I was still close in time to them, though the pain of their loss was like standing in a fire, I could at least feel that they were real, and so was I.

But in death, it is as if they have found their way to the shore and I am still in the middle of the stream, being carried helplessly away from them. Sitting in a canoe without a paddle, all I can do is look back and try to keep them in sight as long as possible.

Now that they have slipped far behind me, not only do they feel less real, so do I. Relationships with people make one real. Lose them, and you start to lose yourself. As if I am fading away with each loss. Disappearing.

Symptoms VII ~ Blanking Out

I realise that I spend a lot of my time on the 'net, and that it tends to suck time away, but I've noticed a lot more lately that time seems to just slip past me in blocks. I can sit down on the sofa and look up and find an hour has passed without me noticing. I just kind of phase out and forget that I am there. Or that the room is there. It's not like time is standing still, but more like I am and time is rushing past me faster than usual.

The Piano

Paralysed by the utter, crushing pointlessness of myself. It's almost a physical sensation of weight.

It occurred to me on the train home last night that it mattered not one whit how I feel about K. It doesn't matter to him, and the only other person in that equation is me.

All kinds of things have been going through my mind. I should leave town, move to another city. I should forget about K. I should hunker down and sever my ties with people. I should climb into my cave and wall up the doorway. I'm panicking, and the flight half of that old instinct is humming right along.

I should get a brain transplant.

K + 2 months, 2 days

My thoughts about K are not entirely coherent, and are further jumbled together with the constantly rising levels of both anxiety and self-hatred that seem to boil up together as though from a tar pit. Sticky. Very hard to get free.

The progression of thoughts go something like...

a clutching panic as another month since our "break-up" on Dec. 7 slides quietly past
the conviction that I should never have expected anything that good to happen in the first place
the remembrance of my status with my parents as the doll they kept for a few years to play with but threw away when their interest waned
a return to the conviction that it is for the best if there are no further personal complications in life
then of course, finding it impossible to face who knows how many more years alone

Another forty years like this?

Back to praying for an honourable out.

Praying

I haven't been doing that well in the last couple of days. With K gone away, I find the days very empty. I go to work and am adequately distracted by it, but find it difficult to concentrate.

But the real dread comes in when I am finished and there is the long train commute home. Perhaps worst of all of it is the walk from the train station, a half-hour plod through the dark town, past all the walled gardens and closed gates. All the houses containing happy inmates. Dogs barking at me. How many times I've wanted to just sit down in the middle of the street and not move. Or shoot one of those goddamned dogs.

The chores of the day, the getting up, the making tea, the eating food, the showering, the blowdrying and face-painting, the dressing, then the walk and the train. Arrive at the office, surf the net, find something to write about.

Then the usefulness of the day is over and I'm left in my own care again.

Frankly, the fate of the world is coming to seem less important every day.

I couldn't read on the train this morning. I had brought my book, (about archaeology in Britain) but didn't even take it out of my handbag. I stared out the windows without seeing anything.

The thoughts? Oh yes. I suppose.

I matter to no human being on earth. Imagine one's existence having not the slightest impact on another person.

But the fact is that I have no right to complain. My situation is of my own creation.

I have an enemy in our social circle, (an odd sensation for anyone past high school age) who has decided to condemn me for immorality. It doesn't matter the details. He's right, of course, but doesn't know why. What he thinks I have done are not in fact the things for which I deserve punishment. I have had the strangest urge lately to tell him exactly what those things are. To give him a list. It keeps coming back to me.

Imagining this conversation, these words ran through my mind again and again on this morning's train ride, as the fields and palm trees and little towns flicked past: "there are two people for whom I was an actual necessity, and I betrayed them. There are two more for whom I was of material importance, and I betrayed them too. All four of them are dead. I know know exactly what I deserve, to the dregs of the cup, and you, sir, can add nothing whatever to that."

I have often said that I feel as if I don't exist. This is not really true. I am only too aware of my own existence, but can find no reason for it whatever. There isn't anyone at all whose lives would be substantially altered at my disappearance.

I find I am praying for the honourable out.

Symptoms VI ~ Cold

I was told once by an Official Head Person that depression is the most physical of the mental illnesses. I'm interested in the variety of physical sensations that must, I suppose, be created by the various chemical signals emanating from my brain.

Anxiety can give one an amazing array of physical symptoms. In my case, depression and anxiety are more or less indistinguishable. I look in the mirror and see the new streaks of white hair and am flooded with fear: Running out of time. Too late to fix anything. It's already over.

The thrill of terror is quite real and it creates a strange kind of moral paralysis. I find it very difficult to function in even the simplest way in the grip of it.

But the feeling I have most of the time, at various levels of severity, is of cold. I have lain awake at night, with the heater up as high as it will go, curled around a hot water bottle and with the cat under the covers, and I am cold. Cold from the inside out. I have wondered if this is real or entirely the product of my brain. It is winter, after all. But the cold I feel certainly comes from a region between my ribs in the front. Adrenaline. My heart races and I can't warm up. I shiver uncontrollably at night, even when there is no physical sensation of cold from the air. I have bought more blankets, worn socks and cardies to bed.

I'm cold.