Thursday, June 11, 2009

A cycle of Cynicism

For a few days now I have not written anything on my blog. Somehow it just seems superfluous. I feel like the young Alvy Singer character from Woody Allan’s Annie Hall. His mother takes him to the doctor because he’s depressed and won’t do anything. When the doctor asks the boy what’s wrong he replies that “the universe is expanding . . . and if the universe is expanding, someday it will break apart and that will be the end of everything.” When the mother exclaims in a worried and angry voice that “He has stopped doing his homework,” the boy says blandly “what’s the point?”

This is how I feel lately. Everything seems rather pointless. Politics most of all. With ‘sexy’ isotope shortages and nasty and crude incompetences everywhere, it all just seems ridiculous. In the next year or so I believe that the Conservatives will finally be pushed from office and it will be a satisfying day when it finally comes. But the ones who lose their seats will have big fat pensions and good jobs in the private sector. Harper will be prosperous and will live to be an old man and die in bed. And others will take the place of the present government, and though they will be the lesser of evils, the same pattern will begin all over again with the regularity of the change of seasons.

I still believe, of course, that things can change for the better. But most of them change so slowly that it is difficult to even notice. Thus cynicism is an easy disease to succumb to. But cynicism is a chronic disease which goes through cycles of extremity. Sometimes one is laid up in bed and at other times you can almost function normally. The Rota Fortunae revolves continually and my cycle is down at the moment. 

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

K: It is inevitable for those who are conscious to feel the low ends of the cycle. I find in these moments a slow walk outdoors feeling the sun on your skin can be very uplifting - nature continues to inspire. C