For almost a week now the emails I’ve sent have gone unanswered. I had a problem with email when I made some changes on December 24, but I thought I found a way around them. It’s has been on my list of things to check into, preferably before tomorrow when I need to send out another story. Which is why today when I received an email response to something I sent out Wednesday morning it was both a relief and a source of enlightenment. My friend wrote, “I’m glad you are feeling hopeful.”

Hopeful? I haven’t slept for the sadness, rage, and anxiety since… Oh, since Wednesday night. How close emotions are. Wednesday morning: hopeful. Wednesday night: pinned to the news feeling nauseous and upset.

This is the part of my blog post where I try to explain the problem to myself and find the hopeful part within. But I’m not there yet. Since Wednesday time has taken on a strange character, stretching out like string cheese and collapsing into itself like a failed quiche.

I have faith that we can get through this together. If we have the will. And I hope we do have the collective will to make Wednesday a one-off event that never repeats. Meanwhile, I’ve learned something about history and about myself.

In history people just go on as they do because there is no choice. The great events that touch us all do not change most of our everyday circumstances. At least not immediately. In the long run, yes, but we live our lives in the short run. I am going to re-examine my 38 AD story with this new wisdom.

About myself, I am far more Burkean than I realized and some of my conservative friends are not Burkeans at all. This is something I need to dig into. How much of my new-found Burkean sensibility is due to my comfortable circumstances? If it is true that where you stand depends on where you sit, what would my perspective be if I sat somewhere else in our culture? Or in another culture? How does that inform my own attitudes and choices? And, finally, how can I use this to make more fully realized characters and situations? How can I develop more empathy?

I have no idea. This is a post of questions and not of answers. But I think that sometimes you have to get the questions out to make things start to cook inside.

I hope you are sleeping, that you are taking care of yourself, and that you are finding meaning and joy within the whirlwind. Be well, friends!