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Dragged Into the Dark Vortex
Lately grayish clouds seem to rest uncomfortably above my head. It’s like living in a premature rainstorm that can’t quite unify into a full, raging tornado. But the threat always seems to be there.
That’s what it’s like for me living in these times. Overall my life is good, and I have friends and blessings aplenty. But the clouds are so persistent that they seem to darken everything.
It isn’t really the clouds that bother me so much: it’s the life that they hide, that place where evil in its many forms resides. That evil used to only peek out now and then; now it shows up in countless ways, through newspapers, TV news, online blogs, to remind us that it is ever-present.
In a way, evil’s presence isn’t news. It’s always been there. But for me, it’s always been in the background. It was something people talked about as if it existed in another time or on another planet. It was a force that others struggled with, and the rest of us could compassionately encourage and support those who dealt with it in their daily lives.
But evil is trying cleverly, relentlessly, to move in. It has a seat in the classroom, in the halls of Congress, protesting the military and law enforcement. It shows up at the dinner table, in the movie theater, in the church pews and our community organizations. It never waits for an invitation. We used to call out evil and watch it crawl away out the door as we decried its presence. Now it walks through the front door uninvited, quietly smiles, and makes itself comfortable as we watch TV or talk about it.
It was once invigorating and satisfying to condemn evil where I saw it. Others would join in, and even if it tried to hang around, we could make its life pretty miserable with our stories of celebration, heroes, resilience, values, and commitment. But I feel myself getting weaker. I’m tired. It seems like there is nowhere to go where evil doesn’t show its ugly face. In fact, sometimes it’s in disguise and looks quite inoffensive. When I ask about its presence, others shrug their shoulders or say it’s only staying for a short time. When I ask how long, they’re never really certain.
I don’t like evil thinking it can hang out anywhere near me. That’s probably why it mostly conceals itself in ugly clouds, just out of reach, preparing to pull me into its latent, swirling vortex. I keep hoping I can simply learn to live with its dark and persistent presence, since I don’t know how to banish it out of existence—or at the very least, out of my life. How does one fully appreciate one’s life with evil appearing nearly everywhere, ready to suck everything into its path?
My greatest fear is that a dominant evil is here to stay, and none of us will be free again.
Published in Culture
There is only one cure to the impending doom that is overshadowing our nation. We need to drastically curtail federal power. There is no incentive for the federal government to ever reduce its power. Trump won’t do it, although his administration has been a welcome reprieve from immediate disaster from an even worse second Clinton administration.
Somehow the governors have to reassert themselves on the federal scene and hamstring the cabal of federal power that are the three branches in DC. If they don’t, we are doomed to a resumption of the depletion of our rights.
So, your depression has a real cause and is legitimate. We do not live in the best of political times. Those times tend to be between shifts in power. We need a shift in power soon, or we will never recover and our descendants will curse us.
This is a great idea, @skyler! We’ve seen the governors start to assert themselves against the federal bureaucracy. If they could just coordinate and work together, they could have a power effect. Thanks!
Just as the Supreme Court in Marbury v. Madison declared that it had the power to interpret the Constititution, so must the governors or state courts assert that right to interpret the plain meaning of the 9th and 10th Amendments. If the federal government wants to ignore those important restrictions on their power (and what human institution has ever consistently done so over generations?) then there must be an antidote. There is nothing that says that only the Supreme Court has the power to decide what it says and it’s dangerous to allow one cabal to rule on every question.
Susan, I can relate. Those inchoate feelings of apprehension have been a little less frequent for me this past year or so, but they are still there. I’m thankful that my obligations (i.e., family, children, job) keep me too preoccupied to dwell on it too much.
This may not be a direct antidote, but I feel Matt Ridley needs to be much more widely read:
http://www.rationaloptimist.com/
Good for you, @keithsf! Those are great ways to engage in life and not get caught up in the craziness. I think Matt Ridley is great–brilliant and a great sense of humor. Thanks!
This Ridley guy seems to have all his oars in the water. I signed up for his newsletter.
Oh Susan, I’m sorry you’re feeling so down. Have you ever read P.J. O’Rourke’s “All the Trouble in the World”? If you haven’t, please check it out. It will surely cheer you up.
And while @julespa beat me to it, I strongly second the suggestion to turn off the news, ALL news, including breaking news discussions here on Ricochet for at least a week, if your duties will permit it. Read lighter fare, but start a news-fast for yourself. Spend that time with nature, and non-news/politics related hobbies, and just enjoying the people around you. The news will all still be there when you come back, but you’ll be able to look at it with a refreshed perspective.
When I first started as a baby DA (and professional evil-fighter) I was appalled at how much bad there was in the world. But you know what I learned over time? The vast majority of people are so much better than they could get away with being, the bad are mostly stupid or ignorant rather than malicious, and the truly malicious are mercifully few. I was lifted up, over and over again by how much good there was in the world.
I hope you feel better soon.
“The best lack all conviction, while the worst
Are full of passionate intensity.”
Almost a century now since Yeats wrote those words! He had a theory–a vision- of history as “gyres” which your word “vortex” brought to mind. It starts out as a tight, controlled spiral, spins out of control to its own destruction, ( “Things fall apart. the center cannot hold”) and starts all over again. We seem to be at the stage where “Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world”.
Does it always seem that way?
All “seeming” will end when we individually die, that’s all we really know. So Voltaire was right: retreat into cultivation of your own garden. You can’t control even that, but you can, during your short existence, have moments of illusion of control.
When I first wrote this post, I was concerned that people would think I was quite literally depressed. In fact, one person sent me a PM with her concern, and I was very touched. I want to assure everyone that I’m fine; I know what depression looks like (it runs in my family) and I don’t fit the diagnosis. But I wrote back to my Ricochet friend and thought I would share it with you:
FYI, I’ve done my share of therapy, always helpful, and have been taking the generic Lexapro (anxiety med) for years. It changed my life. I think you’re correct that I might take a news break, but I probably won’t (too stubborn), mainly because I will return to the same chaotic world. I would also say that the OP was probably as much metaphoric as personal; I have too much beauty in my life to allow the evil that does exist to destroy it. What I am working on is the Buddhist concept (which you are probably familiar with) of ”non-attachment.” I can’t detach myself from the world, but I can find a way to hold it in a way that doesn’t pull at my soul, with less emotional engagement and upset. I don’t react to my personal life and relationships that way, but I am working on non-attachment with the rest of the world around me. Gradually it is really freeing me up; paradoxically I can watch events drifting by and not cling to them. It’s sort of like ”being in the world but not of it.”
If anyone wants to ask me about this comment, please do. I want to assure you that except for normal ups and downs, I’m happy and blessed.
@susanquinn, thanks for the reassurance about possible depression. It can be insidious.
I studied Buddhist techniques in my youth, after discovering that Buddhist breathing exercises could stop an asthma attack. I was very asthmatic as a kid, to the point where my folks had to learn to give me adrenaline injections, the common therapy in the Fifties and Sixties. Picture being a college kid in the Seventies and having to explain to a state cop who has pulled over a carful of long-hairs that you have a real reason for carrying an injection kit. I think that may have been the best application for my Philosophy/Comparative Religion degree, if you don’t count the sheer pleasure of being able to tie evangelist doorbell-ringers in knots if they catch me in a bad mood.
I had a bit of an epiphany last week during our new pastor’s message. I’ve been feeling sorry for myself, pissed off because the prostate cancer therapy has made me gain 20 pounds and increased my pernicious inertia. I’m always berating myself for not accomplishing as much as I think I should. Not being able to easily rise from a chair makes it harder to get started on something. I don’t remember exactly what in Pastor Olga’s message triggered the thought, but I was struck by the idea that my own self-contempt was my biggest problem, and also the easiest one to fix. Okay, I’m too fat and I get tired too fast. But I’m in remission, I can breathe, and I have every reason to expect the old bod to keep working for a couple more decades. I’m adjusting my attitude. And darn if things aren’t getting better. Funny how that works.
Good for you, @douglaspratt! Most of our lives we are guided by our perceptions, how we frame things. Too often, people don’t realize they have choices about how they see and define things. That’s an awesome application of insight and fortitude that you showed. Meditation is still an important part of my life, too!