why me?

 "I cried, out of helplessness and delight,
because for a moment life gave me more than
I had any right to expect."

I once read that Pat Conroy said his sister didn't speak to him for a few years after he wrote The Prince of Tides. That has stuck with me, so it is with tremendous but ignored trepidation that I share this. The dearest in my world will recognize themselves though maybe not each other.

Earlier this month, I wasn't feeling myself.  I knew I was physically fine, but I felt as heavy and as stuck as a boulder in concrete and I didn't know why.

I wasn't sad or depressed. I went about daily life. I enjoyed wine and food as I always do, and W made me genuinely laugh every single day as she always does.  Yet I had lost every whisper of my usual lightness of being. My internal ache had not yet localized. I was exhausted but didn't need sleep.

Very late one Sunday night I received a message from my friend I call The Intuitive. I love her. I fear her. She has juju. She has that type of juju I often wish I had and sometimes give thanks that I don't. 

She was checking on me, my energy popping up in her orbit.

I clarified that I was fine, though most everyone around me wasn't, and that I had even cancelled evening plans with W because I absolutely had to crash on the past Friday afternoon. Feeling the weight of the world, I escaped and indeed, slept like a rock for a few hours.

Could the tumbling down of my energy have been relayed to her?

My sister, though she is miraculously recovering so well from a recent stroke, remains foremost on my mind, but the number of people around me who are struggling, sick, or healing, is not exaggerated. 

People I care about deeply are enduring hardships and heartaches: 

-A dear ex-student/friend (born blind, smart as a whip, suffered a stroke a few years ago, recently became suddenly immobile) is in the hospital/rehab from pneumonia and a blood clot. Separate issues are requiring the future surgical removal of an eye.
-This student's angelic mother who cares for him and a husband newly diagnosed with Alzheimer's, is stretched to the max.
-Another ex-student, out of state, is transferring from one nursing facility to another, after months of living shelter to shelter, with no family support. He is limited to light perception and has many health issues.
-A friend with MS has had two difficult knee surgeries with extended rehab following each.
-A neighbor friend just lost a step-daughter, and not too long ago, her brother died.
-A neighbor/friend has had three heart procedures and a skin cancer removal scare, all in a very short period of time.
-A friend is engaged in stressful and expensive diligence to support her beloved pet in the dog's aging stages of kidney disease.
-A friend is depressed.
-A friend in the midst of a perfect storm of life: expensive house repairs, blood pressure glitches, numerous dental procedures, car severely damaged by an at-fault driver in a parking lot.
-A friend who is 96 and visually limited, is happily still living independently but with very few visitors and whose heart breaks missing the days of big family gatherings.

There but by the grace of God, go I.

Putting pen to paper always helps me sort things out. I am perceptive but I am not an empath. What I was experiencing, taking in so much concern for so many people, is what I will term thriver's guilt; steps removed from survivor's guilt, but still very, very real and very, very heavy.

Maybe for the first time, or the first that feels authentic, I fully embraced the ethos of the Serenity Prayer, and have made peace with my helplessness. 

Blessings and good health to everyone.

William Bryant Logan
The Jumping Dove
House Beautiful, December 1992