Loneliness

This little line from James Taylor's Line 'em Up has been coming into my head today (with melody):

Nobody knows me--Nobody Understands.

Here's the video.



It's a song that captures how I'm feeling lately. This verse really nails it.

At that time my heart was all broke
I looked like ashes and smelled like smoke
And I turned away from my loving kind
Try to leave my body and live in my mind
But it's much too much emotion
To hold it in your hand
They've got waves out on the ocean
They're gonna wear away the land

I'm feeling in some way ... lonelier than I ever remember feeling. The way this presents is that I'm driving along in my car, feeling that feeling, and I think, "Self, you should call somebody on the cell phone". And then I try to think of who to call, and there's nobody to call. I mean there's a *lot* of names and numbers in my context list, but thinking of calling any of them produces zero anticipation of cessation of the feeling I'm feeling, to any degree.

It's a sort of ... disconnected feeling. There's also this relatively new sensation (at least having it to this degree is newish) that there's no one out there with more power than me who will take steps to make sure that things turn out well for me and for those I love. I think there's a new sense of separation from my dad having that role. Maybe it's fairly pathetic to say so, since I'm 33 years old and married with children, but up until recently there was a least a sort of ... some kind of bottom line thing in the back of my head that said "Don't worry, if things really fall apart, Dad will help with at least good advice, and probably some sort of actual tangible help as well." It springs from the fact that he seems *so* enormously vulnerable and alone now that my mom has died, and I have the sense that he needs *my* help rather than vice versa. This sort of gives the lie to the idea that finding some people needier than me and helping them will help me cope with this whole feeling, since knowing that about my dad doesn't seem to help at all.

I suspect that this touches on the emotional heart of what people mean when they say God is dead. The world is not safe, nor good--very very bad things happen to people all the time, and up until now I've been convinced I'll probably be mostly spared, somehow. But just lately, that feeling is more gone than ever.