48 Hours Gone in The Wind

 My lungs still bothered me yesterday. Thursday is a blur of weariness, I overslept again today.

Thursday I woke up two hours late and in a blind panic I called work. I did not get there until  8 am, we were done before noon. My bank account is aching.

I may have to get working on selling my version of "The Masque of the Red Death" (Like click the link to your left, and buy a copy, please.)

Nothing written here, nothing written anywhere. I kept the email at bay. My trying not to read the political news is only half-working. I read some, but not posting. 

I watched The Last Kingdom on Netflix. It kind of overlaps with Vikings. The latter may actually be better in terms of characters and tone in its early seasons. However, The Last Kingdom is more consistent in its fidelity to history. It holds up better in the long run.

I notice one thing about Bernard Cornwell. His Sharpe novels really tell the early career of Wellington through Richard Sharpe; The Last Kingdom tells of Alfred through Uhtred.

Off to bed early, I read a little of Gore Vidal's The Golden Age. I still find it unsatisfactory.

I only overslept an hour on Friday. Less coughing. Only a few minutes late to work. I left a little early and stopped at the apartment. Good thing because I forgot my bag of materials for the group therapy session. My sister texted me that my oldest nephew is back in jail. I had to run for the bus.

I had time for lunch. The Advent Fast is on and I have not been good at my fasting. I stopped at the Chinese restaurant in the strip mall for Hunan bean curd. It opened my sinuses.

The new guy in the group kept the conversation going on long enough that we did not have time for the weekly lecture.

I picked up some groceries. Heavy on veggies for the fast.

I did crash when I got back here. I tried watching The Three-Body Problem, only I cannot sit long enough to just watch anything. This is a show that deserves watching, too. I read the novel in prison and was very impressed; whether it was Chinese or only written by a Chinese, it seemed a different perspective on the genre.

I revised my other short play. My hope is it is as humorous as I intended. I have decided to call it "The Beer Bros".

I finally reached KH by phone and we caught up with what has been going on. In the middle of our conversation, CC returned my call. KH did not sound so happy about her calling. Cc and I talked a little about my nephew. Two weeks out of inpatient treatment, he snags another felony. Even through her own addiction problems, she had advice. Most of the time we talked about her intake papers. She read me some of the things she had written - I was awed by her honesty. She does not back down from saying what she thinks caused her problem and still causes her problems. I think most people with her history write and say what will endear them most to their addiction counselors. With practice, she could be a terrifying writer. All I can do is keep encouraging her to stay the course she has set for herself - to finally say what is in her head, not to take any opposition as a rebuke, and to stand up for herself.

Why do all this? Because if we do not try to improve the world around us, then we are complicit in its ugliness. That ugliness fed and sustained my depression. Now, I must make amends. If I can help CC free herself, to become the person she wants to be and could be, then I have done some good to balance off my running away from the fight to do what can be done to make this a better world. It is not a perfect world, that never can happen, but we need not - I should not have - reveled in its ugliness. Yes, I did find out how far I could go. Leaving me wishing for things unseen. The counselor yesterday said we should all know that we belong in group therapy. I wonder what ailment of mine is being treated. I stick because there may be something to learn and because not doing so means a trip back to prison. What I am not hearing is about goals for a better life. Oh, well. Another insufficiency, like my supervised release order, does not mean that I do not have the obligation to undo and atone for the damage I did when younger. That leaves me with my writing and trying to help people like CC.

I called KH back. We talked a little more about Shakespeare (he was watching the David Tennant Hamlet that I found for him) and Bollywood's Haider.

I watched a bit more of The Three-Body Problem before locking up the browser and decided that was enough for the day.

Now, I need to clean up this place, get the laundry done, maybe go down the street to see about a food pantry, get the play edited, and maybe out the door. It is gloomy, dank, chilly out of doors - welcome to November in Indiana.

sch