Tuesday's Gone With The Wind

I don't know what kind of world you want to live in, but when I learned that Dido's Lament was originally performed by children for children, well, I am glad that wasn't my education. I suppose it may have been intended as a cautionary tale for wayward women of the 17th century, as the indoctrination into the patriarchy always starts young. But, wow. 

When I lived in Manhattan, I must have owned 20 different versions of

Dido and Aeneas by Nathaniel Dance-Holland.

Dido's Lament (and more than 5 versions of Gloomy Sunday). It is the most arresting aria. Jessye Norman's version is my favorite. She also was a friend of Derrick's, my professor, who had Norman's autographed picture hanging in our office.

I am not a student of opera, and had no knowledge of Henry Purcell nor English opera until hearing Norman sing. Hmm. Go figure. 

This is going somewhere.  Maybe. 

Dido, bereft that her beloved left her, builds a funeral pyre and throws herself on it. The Gods, Venus really, had infected her with the belief (via Cupid) that Aeneas was her only beloved. She believed she couldn't live without him, and so, didn't. 

I am not that guy. I am not that guy even slightly. I was a big romantic when I was young, largely through the propaganda of television and my reading of Greek and Roman tragedies and novels. Such dreck colored what I thought love was going to be, what it was supposed to be, how it was supposed to manifest. I had a girlfriend once, Margy, for whom every Friday for the first year we dated,  I bought fresh flowers. Now, to be fair, she was a sweet woman, and was generous and giving. But I was acting a part. I was doing what I believed I was supposed to do. I loved her, to be sure, but I was young and it felt, and still feels, like I was play-acting.

I won't build a pyre over this lost love or any other, nor throw myself on any available fire. I would throw myself in front of a train to save Jenny or my kids or my sisters, I believe. Such sacrifice comes from love, it is true, but that isn't the same as ending it all because a love has turned cold, or abandoned you.

I write all of these musings, thinking about how I might extricate myself from this hole of depression. It isn't despair, mind you, but a malaise that has creeped up on me and enveloped me, like a slow rolling fog. I am slovenly, sloth like, and indeterminate about anything much. As I live and breathe, I must be o.k., right?

I went to bed early last night. It was a restless sleep. About 10:30, I woke in a dead panic. No, seriously, I was panicking about dying. We all fear death. We like to think that knowing of our own mortality makes us unique among the animals.  Tell that to elephants or Orca whales. No. What separates us, I would wager, is we think about it a lot. We play with the idea. We create tales, write books, develop video games and movies. We roll in it as if we were dogs rolling in some foul smell in the grass. And now, it wakes me up out of a deep sleep. Bolt upright in bed, I was almost sweating. I got up to pace, not frantic, but trying to quell the sense of immersive dread. The feeling stayed with me, it moved with me when I went out to the landing. It mimicked me, as I looked over the wall and down on Abby, who was splayed on the couch, holding her phone a foot from her face. Even when I went back in my room it followed. I laid down, tried to forget it.  I put on a podcast to distract myself. Still, it was there.  I didn't think I'd ever fall asleep, and then it was hours later, 4 AM, still pitch dark, and I was roused from a fitful sleep by sleeping dogs I could not let lie.  Sadly, that bit isn't metaphorical. So, I got up and let them out and coaxed them back in after they did their business, crated them, and went to sleep, this time on the sofa, until 6.

I got Jenny and her sisters from the airport tonight. Jenny is home, happy that she saw her uncle, her aunt and cousins. Me. I am just happy to shut my eyes again. My vivid dreaming is about the only thing I look forward to these days.

Finally, a puzzle. Dido threw herself upon a funeral pyre, burning her body to ash.  Why did Purcell write the aria, "When I am laid in earth?" That doesn't track. Good night.