The Avalanche of Loneliness in Small Matters was a little obscure; I can tell from your comments. It was fresh from the emotional soup pot just beneath my skin. And there was more in there for me to think about.
My cheerful-most-days-nature bubbles right up from my toes. It’s a bouncy caffeinated energy that steps right through shoulder blades into chest: gregarious; straightforward; accompanied by little shadows of timidity. When I feel strong, hail-fellow-well-met stomps the timid. When the timid tap runs faster, the energy slows and thickens. Melancholy might wonder while uncertainty and reflection spin upwards and steam my lenses.
Possessed by strength, I plant and expand. A whiff of fear warns me that small matters might sweep me in and consume me. I notice how much of life they would like to absorb, how much time they demand from others, these small matters. Preparation, method, sequence, clean-up: I strenuously forbid and ignore these. I also admire and crave them.
Sometimes I run from fretful details in my work and life. Yeah, sure every big project is a multitude of small steps. The infinite listing easily overwhelms me with desperation and futility, turning creative tasks into domestic ones: put things away; clean the kitchen; read the mail; pay the bills. Some people do these things well, gracefully, routinely, even joyfully. Some avoid them. I avoid, avoid, avoid and relent.
These tasks can be delicious, breeding well-crossed lists or they can provide a safe place to hide. But whether I’ve embraced them—either as a hiding place or as jobs-well-done—the pleasure is small and private. The insularity of time in the small matters edges close to loneliness. The loneliness might trigger the fracture of the snow shelf. Before long, the powder cloud swirls, losing me in the avalanche of my wildest fears.
Alternating these perspectives, big to small and back again, tires my mind. It’s part of the upside-down of so many things on today’s program. Today, the small screen is the big screen; yesterday’s scrap blossoms into a volume of idolatry. A step half-a-world-long flickers across a satellite. Screaming out here in the wilderness—sometimes lonely, sometimes fine—is sometimes both.