March 26th, 2020
Yesterday was a beautiful day. It certainly one was in a meteorological sense. Wisconsin is much like Siberia, ot at least a bit like eastern Europe. We don’t really have a spring. We have a brief gap between the horrors of an endless winter and the intensity of a brutal summer. There is no easing into it. It is like falling off a cliff.
A young woman lives with us. The “us” refers to Karin and myself. In normal times (whatever “normal” means), this young woman is busy with therapy sessions, 12-step meetings, and part time work as a barista. In normal times, this young woman would be slinging coffee, and giving some philistines a necessary class about painting and art. But these are not normal times, and this young woman is stuck in our house, watching Netflix, staring at her phone, and possibly losing her mind.
This young woman is not alone in losing her mind. I am actively doing the same thing. What is happening is that the current activities of our society are destructive, not just disruptive. Keeping people physcially apart makes sense in a way. I understand that. However, it makes people a bit crazy. It makes me a bit crazy.
This young woman decided to walk a couple miles from our home to Bender Park. There she could view the movements of the waters of Lake Michigan. Her actions freaked me out. She was gone for a couple hours. The young woman did not answer her phone. She did not ask for any help.
I walked Shocky, the young woman’s pet. I walked the dog, over and over again.
I came home. The girl was lying in bed. She was wounded. Her head was bruised and bleeding.
She had fallen off the edge of the bluffs near the lake. She fell off a cliff.
The girl is still alive.
So am I.
Frank is Emptiness 