Tonight we had a storm blowing in just as the sun was setting. The wind was blowing hard, and scattered raindrops would hit like small, wet, pinpricks on anyone who stood out to face it. As far back as I can remember, these nighttime storms have sometimes stirred in me a certain mood which I have no name for, and which I have encountered only one or two familiar descriptions in my entire life.
The mood is strange: It is contemplative and restless. I feel as if somehow the veil of social familiarity has been pulled aside and I can see the world as it really is, unfiltered. I find in such moments a deep love for the natural world and distaste for social arrangements: It drives me to seek solitude and quiet, so that I am not disturbed by music, or by other people’s emotions or conversations, but have only the grass and clouds and wind and rain for company. And yet it’s not overly calm: In these moments I find that I am filled with passion. Passion for the human condition, sympathy and lamentation for the circumstances in which people live their lives. Deep thoughts about my own future, and deeply caring about it going a certain way.
It feels in such times as if I have awakened from a dream, as if I am thinking clearly and able to make real choices about my life, and as if the rest of the time some missing aspect of awareness prevents any true reflection or capable choice. I typically deal with it by taking a long walk outdoors, then coming back and and cooling down by indulging in some melancholy fiction, or reading moving poetry, or sometimes by talking to a friend who might understand. And sometimes, I resolve to change my life according to the passion felt in that moment.
This was the first time I have had the feeling in a few years. I hadn’t realized it was gone, but I’m glad it’s come back. The feeling told me that I long for a homey life with my fiancee, in a comfortable house somewhere far enough outside of town to see the stars but not too many neighbors. It told me that I need to make more money and escape the fate of living in an apartment. But most of all, it told me that I need to be a jolly family man who reads a lot and knows even more.
I’ve been indulging in distraction, recently. It makes it easy to forget that this is my life and there are things I want to be, but which I am not even trying to do. I have been worried about the danger from AI and taken what feel like concrete steps to help. But I haven’t gotten lost balancing that duty against the comfortable life I desire. Instead I’ve just been working the job I don’t like, not even trying to build the details of the life I want, and letting the worry take over without usefully motivating duty.
But no more. The storm has blown through and it’s left me changed. Time to see what I can really do.
Smooth As Amber 