The Hole in My Soul

I just sent this note in reply to a dear friend who asked me how my day was yesterday with the hope that it was a good day:

I had a "different" day yesterday, not sure I'd call it "good" necessarily and likewise not sure I'd call it "bad", it was a very emotionally raw, instrospective day like most of my days as of late. At one point last night I found myself slumped down in the doorway between my kitchen and studio frozen, sitting on the floor, unable to move, unable to cry, unable to focus and I remained just sitting on the floor in that doorway for what seemed to be an eternity but it was close to an hour I'd say.

I wouldn't classify it as depression, I wouldn't classify it as lonliness, I wouldn't classify it as sadness but more rather a combination of the three. It was a feeling I've come to know quite well in these past five months, a feeling I've had all my life at times....it is the "hole", the hole within myself that I have previously filled with my addictions in order to not to feel it and when it hit me last night it was like someone hit me with a cattle prod directly in my heart, directly in my soul. I was rendered totally defenseless, unable to move, unable to emote, unable to do anything other than to remain sitting on the floor and wait it out.

When it finally subsided I neither had any new insights, clarity, serenity or anything remotely positively intuitive to draw from the experience. It simply lifted from me like a passing fog bank one encounters while driving down the grapevine at night....I stood up and made a cup of tea and shuddered a bit and finished setting up my studio.