Sometimes, you just have to turn off the radio/tv/internet until you can catch your breath and get over the frenzy. But there's always the frenzies waiting on the silence: what is that weird twinge? What exactly did I say last weekend? Was it as rude as it seems now? Was that a shadow or a bug? OMG, what is that freaking twinge?!?
It's summer not far from the Texas coast, so hurricanes and crazy weather are always a popular area of concern, but Houston has already had been partially submerged this season and I suspect it would happily float down the bayou and keep spreading.
And how do you process the information that comes in, the shouting and the implications and the stories that spiral ever more shrilly into apocalypse? I have a draft in front of my about a simple sadness and it floats from my head on the flood of darker fears and deeper anger that, as yet, refuses to be channeled in a story. Last night's good advice was to keep your eyes open but to understand that you have to keep moving forward. Be aware, not paralyzed.
It's not fear, exactly, that slaps the pen out of my hand. It's that awful attention, the face pressed against the glass that refuses to turn around. The need for distraction or horrified attention.
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