Waiting for the next shoe to drop

Friday, May 09, 2014

It is the Friday before my birthday, and the rain makes it feel more like early April than May.  I ache to walk down by the river, but I don’t want to get wet. So I sit in my office and stare down at Washington Street like I’m in the midst of a dream.

This is never a good time of year for me – that almost half way point in the year when I wear down like a defective Energizer rabbit, and struggle to make it through the week so I can rest.

It’s not age so much as the time of year when the resolutions I made at the start of the year seem too much a burden for me to carry on with.

Freud called it an anniversary syndrome – in which we attach meaning to certain days or events when they really lack any significance other than what we assign them.

I tend to have two times of year when the world falls apart – mid November and mid-May. They are usually associated. Mid-November historically brings about a major change in my life, not good or bad so much as different – significant shifts in my world to which I must adapt. By mid-May, I am faced with the consequence of this change – especially if I have failed to adapt to it. I am forced to make choices between alternatives, neither of which I will be happy with, but I must somehow decide is the least of two evils.

 Much of all this is done in hindsight.

I see the significance of the November change only when I am confronted by the obstacles in May.

So here it is May, and I’m waiting, wondering what shoe will drop that will make the year’s choices obvious.

Ultimately, each choice made in May makes me stronger, although it is like being in the midst of a crisis which you do not yet know the outcome of.

It always seems bad at the time, and like the hindsight looking back at November, hindsight looking back at May makes me realize how much I’ve grown.

But I’m on the cusp, waiting, watching, wondering what comes next, when we the next shoe drop, and will it land on my head?