of all the songs in james taylor's catalog, this is one of the few that i actually have a memory of it's release and subsequent airplay on the popular music radio stations of the time. i was in my sophomore year of high school, and i can remember hearing this song playing at all kinds of different times -- doing my homework, riding in our family car, participating in extra-curricular activities (i have a particularly distinct memory of this song coming on the radio as i was helping with the homecoming parade float of a club i was in at the time) or just laying on my bed on one of many lazy sundays listening to "america's top 40" with casey kasem.
for some reason, this song has always touched me deeply, and, given the subject matter, i was always mystified as to the reason. add to this that i don't think i even realized what the song was actually about until probably a decade or so later, and you have a real reason for puzzlement over why i had such a strong degree of personal resonance so immediately. certainly the gentle but haunting vocals provided by jt and j.d. souther contribute to evoking great emotion, but i've always sensed there was something more about the song that i just couldn't place the reason for the connection i felt to it.
i was listening to it today, and as i sang along, doing my best (and likely failing) to harmonize with the lush vocals of misters taylor and souther, the revelation that had been eluding me for over thirty years came into sharp view. "this is a song about feeling displaced after a loss" (in this case a loss of relationship after a divorce). as tears welled up and poured out of my eyes, i further realized that at this current time i'm dealing with what at least feels like the loss of a friendship, one that i know i had such high hopes for and a desire to see grow and deepen over many years to come. it didn't take much further contemplation to recognize that the personal resonance over the years and even the tears of the present day were tied to so much more than this specific relationship.
over the years i've experienced quite a bit of loss -- much of which i've chronicled in this blog either as it was occurring or as reflections on my past experiences. today i feel that the potential for further loss is so palpable, it is making it difficult to finish this entry. indeed, it is not just about this friend (though the pain from that alone feels as if it is shredding my heart). it is also about the other losses in the near past most significant of which is my failed relationship with michael. and it is about losses that i fear are to come.
i am not doing well. actually, i am having moments where i feel as far from well as one could possibly be. i feel no sense of connection with the work i am doing any longer, the disappointments stemming from which have definitely taken a toll on my engagement and belief that i have or will make any difference at all. and whether or not it is the adjustment to the new medication, i'm unsure, but i feel a great deal of loss in my ability to manage my emotions and cope with what is taking place in my life. several times a day, i just find myself crying for long periods. in some ways it feels as if my sanity is on the verge of completing its gradual slippage, and i contemplate ending my life with probably the greatest frequency i have in my life to date.
i may have mentioned in a previous entry that i have a visit with my primary care physician the day after next. i am concerned that he will determine that i will need to go into an inpatient facility for treatment. i dealt with this possibility last year and i think i shared at that time my fear that such an event would be so disruptive to my life plans that i wasn't sure if would ever recover from it.
i got a reprieve then as i agreed to enter into treatment with a psychiatrist instead. he prescribed one set of medications that worked briefly, and for a moment, i thought maybe i was finally on my way to recovery. but then they failed. as did the next. and the next after that. and now i am on yet another medication that i am not entirely optimistic will help either (especially given the rocky start i am having with it), and i wonder how many failures of this type can one soul endure.
so, from reliving what has happened and speculating on what maybe will come, i have definitely developed a strong sense of being displaced in the world around me. i've used so many phrases and metaphors to describe this feeling -- "no one hears me," "i'm lost in the woods with no hope to be found," "no one ever comes to find me" to name a few -- all of them speaking to the fact that i do not feel that i belong here anymore if i ever did at all.
and i think maybe it is time to stop fighting. maybe it is time to just let the madness and darkness claim me and have them drive me where they will.
maybe. for now i just know that i am bone weary, alone, and in need of some love. and i have a song to share.
her town too - james taylor
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