Tired of a diet of crime TV, we’ve turned to music and sports documentaries. Among other inspirational themes, both deliver their takes on overcoming adversity. Shot, but not dead. Never give in and never give up. Fear is energy you can use.
Last night’s look at the life of a many-times-in-rehab-and-psych-wards blues singer/songwriter, I’m thinking about despair. I’m old enough to have seen it over and over and to have known it. Curiously, it doesn’t discriminate. Young, old, rich, poor, clever, fool, faithful, faithless, sinner, innocent. It puts its hands on our health, finances, ability to conceive, physicality, mental acuity and relationships, and that’s a short list. It can come like black ice.
We dull our impotency with lots of things. Pills, pillow, platitudes, more. In my own opinion, not much works but getting through. Maybe last night’s virtuoso grinds it all down into the best powder: you choose life, and you get up.
Going on the road makes her life make sense, gives her routine. I get that. I need the stanza and verse of order.
Loving the blues and appreciating that light comes from darkness, J. always adds, above all, be kind. Someone near you is fighting a great battle. He points to uplifting counsel to make your bed first, from Admiral William H. McRaven, from his 2014 Commencement address at the University of Texas.
