For a writer, I am living on the edge of the dream: time is irrelevant and days segue smoothly into a blur relieved only by visits by or to friends and to sign on for my government stipend. Free time is all of my time and how I organise it is entirely down to me. When the beginnings or a story or poem occur to me, I can just sit and let it arrive immediately, from concept, sentence or stanza to reality in a shockingly short space of time.
But behind this apparently idyllic existence lies a darker heart, a place closer to reality where my debts mount daily as I have no job to make any offer of a payment arrangement viable. My cats, companions of over a decade, are both in failing health and I do not have the werewithal to even attempt diagnosis, let alone treatment. I take advice as best I can and while everyone is sympathetic, without funds they will do nothing.
People I care about fight their way through their daily travails without the time or inclination to talk, as they focus on getting by. I understand this as my precarious inner balance is maintained by simply ignoring situations until they require direct action to stave them off for a little longer as I have no means to deal with them permanently. But the very lack of communication translates at a low emotional level into an unfairly percieved lack of care. Nothing that can be done but for the intellect to rein in the despondence as best it can.
At least I have the option of writing. The contemplation of what this way of existing is like for those who are not fortunate enough to have a creative gift embedded in their psyche is mordantly depressing, and therein lies the insidious heart of the matter. Despite self-publishing my work and contributing to a couple of websites, there is nothing of hope in my world except the indefatigable truths I hold inside, down where my faith lies close to my breathing and heartbeat.
It is this that stalls me, erodes me, presses me down into the masses who share this hopelessness of being grist to a mill that ceased to be productive or helpful long ago. I see no end to this without sheer luck. My greatest efforts have amounted to nought through timing and competition from others in my professional field, combined with company reticence to invest in something that could improve their environment and save them money. False economy and short-term results are all that seem to matter these days, whether on a micro or macro economic scale.
This is the edge to the blade. intellectually, I can appreciate the motivations behind those who do not help me, but emotionally it drives me to unshed tears of frustrated fury. As the old wisdom states: you cannot internalise that sort of venom without poisoning yourself eventually.
So I continue this half-life, thankful for the gifts and generosities that keep me vaguely afloat and calm while simultaneously railing at the circumstances that prevent me moving on. As I have explained to others, it is not that I have bad luck, it is just that my timing always seems to be slightly off 🙂
This little hiatus cannot last, I know that without a doubt. How it will end and where I will arrive at next are things I cannot predict or plan.
At the whim of fate, in the lap of the gods, my future in the hands of others; call it what you will, my voyage is beyond my control for now. So I shall chart my journey through the high seas of “interesting times” and see where the currents of life take me. Where possible I will steer a little. If lucky I will regain control, as much as that is possible.
Until then, like countless navigators lost in uncharted regions, I shall write of the sights, sounds and thoughts that come while waiting and hoping for a better tomorrow.
THE SILENT JUDGE 