No Road Alone

I mean for there to be no melodrama, and so I begin this post like this: I am practically fine. But for the past two weeks, I've been taking the sorts of tests one takes to prove or disprove fine.

I'm not dwelling on that. I'm dwelling on this: The world is gooded through. Yes, I'm watching the news. I'm worrying out loud. I grow impatient for solutions, too. I bump up across all varieties of raw, of wrong, of unjust, of incalcuable; I feel myself sink into trenches of despair. But I am rocked and rescued by the good that nonetheless prevails. By people who do their jobs well, and do them humanely (barium, they say, is like an extended pina colada; try to remember your first kiss, they say, when your anxiety seems to stop your blood from flowing). By friends who send funny and loving emails. By bloggers who couldn't even begin to know how valued they are. By a son sending all hieroglyphic form of the famed 160-character text message.

Not to mention a husband who stopped one day beneath the dogwood tree outside my office and noticed that the finch had supped on every last skinny black seed. He reached up and took the feeder down. He filled it with new seed. He stretched and slid the feeder back into place, like he was ornamenting a Christmas tree. He went on his way, then, my husband did. And the birds returned in force.