W.76th and Amsterdam, it came over me then 10.10.07

I have abused this little space of late, and neglected it as well. It has for too long served as a pleasant little window onto pleasant little scenes that, as pleasant as they are to capture, really fail to capture the whole view.

The whole view is...dismal? Too strong a word, maybe. After all, I've been in dismal mode and I like to reserve it for balls to the wall true desperation.

This? This view is...dark? Scary? Lonely? Uncertain? Certainly unpleasant. I feel this unpleasant sense that things are just not as they should be. And I don't know what to do to make them better. I read this piece of advice: "Meet every problem with decision." And I like it. I like it because it slaps down this very "poor me-ing" that I am so engaged in at this moment. I like it becuase it assumes you (yes, YOU) have the power, the volition, the stuff to change the problem at hand into less of a problem. On a good day, into a solution.

But what if you don't feel like you have it in you? What if you don't know what to change, and there is the off-chance that what's making you unhappy is just that: things you cannot control? Aieee. That's the real fear inducer there.

I feel cut off from people that I used to rely on. No, not the whole breakup litany of sad and alone. That's a factor, I'm sure, but this goes deeper. Friends. Family. Acquaintances, even. I'm feeling...cut off. Like the phone line has been cut and I keep picking it up and attempting to dial, and saying, "Hello? Hello?" like an idiot into dead air.

Professionally, I'm in the most precarious position I've been in yet. That, I suppose is easy to change with decision and action. But all the same, it's daunting.

I'm trying to stick to the small stuff. Reading good books, taking trails in the woods without comparing them to better trails and more breathtaking views, eating a nice lunch for no real reason at all, music--Lucia deLamamoor, Well You Needn't, The Melvins, the Bach minuet the busker played on his violin at the top of the metro escalator that struck me so soundly, lying in bed and listening to the radio for two hours on Saturday morning if I feel like it. All in the service of remembering it is good to be alone without being lonely.

But I am. And worse than that, I am not making any decisions.

I just read this quote from Brancusi: "Simplicity is complexity resolved." Although I pretty near loathe Brancusi, I love this.

And when I was in the airport recently, a little boy was reading a book to his younger sister. The word 'attic' came up in the story. The girl stopped her brother and asked 'What's an attic?' Her brother thought for a moment. He said, 'You know our basement?' His sister nodded. 'An attic is our basement on top of a house.' She nodded, and the story continued. Perfect. So perfect.

The world only makes sense to you through what you already understand. So what do I feel like I am lacking? Why can't I use what I know to resolve this complexity into my own simplicity?