ManicDDaily

I woke up today feeling terribly depressed.  Yes, it’s probably my chemistry (the down side of the m-word), but, as I browsed through the online New York Times, I also felt that I had every right to blame my hopelessness on the world in general.

Everything seemed to bring up Reagan’s old (deficit-producing) supply-side economics;  they seemed not just to have been swallowed by the American people but to have become an integral part of the body politic–its eaten-out heart (as in “eat your heart out’);  the idea that compassion is bad while greed is good (for society as well as the greedy), almost a moral imperative.

There was the article about the refusal of politicians to support improvements in infrastructure despite the terrible need both for the improvements and the jobs the improvements would provide.  Then the negativity towards healthcare (in one, a Florida politician whose company was indicted for massive medicare fraud.)

Then there were the  little children bullying other little children, seemingly egged on by parents who are happy, primarily, that their kids are at the top of the popularity heap.

I don’t want to detail the stories of truly horrific brutality, stories where even the words “lack of compassion” can’t be squeezed in.

Normally, I try to spend Saturday re-writing one of my old children or teen novels.  (I have a few that for years have seemed sort of finished, and yet still aren’t quite “done.”)  But, suddenly, my little fictional tales seemed ridiculously trivial.   Sure, they all promote compassion; but they are also, due to my lack of talent and vision, not particularly life-changing, society-changing.  Not even, perhaps, life or society-nudging.

Of course, one would like to write life-changing books!  But what if you just don’t/can’t.

Feeling grandiosely whiney, I looked over at my very conveniently located muse–that is, my good old dog Pearl, snoozing at the bottom of my bed.

Talk about a lack of grandiosity!  Talk about forging ahead!

Pearl might very well like to be a noble dog, a celebrated dog (a Balto!) even just a big, strong dog. But she was born cute and fluffy and a little bit clownish.

Pearl might even like to be young again, with fully functioning limbs.

Nonetheless, Pearl presses doggedly through life each day, doing what she does as best as she can.   And not doggedly just in the sense of persistently and dutifully–but with a joy us non-canines (and blocked writers) can only wonder at.