Disappointment

Many of the visitors who come to see me are dominated by disappointments in their lives. We members of Clan Anthropos can be disappointed in just about anybody ... Disappointed in our Parents for not being sufficiently kind or watchful or protective ... Children for not being stars every day or for reproducing our own historical way of doing housekeeping in their rooms .... Hey, just shut the door! .... Lovers for not being expressive enough in the bedroom or thankful enough or for showing their age. At kind moments, one lover says to another: 'you look just like you did 45 years ago.' What did Mama Cass say ... Dream a little dream for me. .... We get disappointed in things or body organs, too ... ...... Why doesn't that car start? It only has travelled the equivalent of 6 earthly circumnavigations! .... ..... Damn ... I was never allergic to gluten or dairy intolerant before! .... .... ..... ..... What is it, this feeling that we betimes show gesturally when someone says something that doesn't quite meet the highest possible standards that some voice in our head sets and then, essentially, demands of others. ..... ..... Players in Last Quarter experience disappointment ... Hell, I mean me .... I am experiencing disappointment, today. A favorite writer/thinker of mine is coming to town and a fine ex-student of mine will be speaking, too. The older guy wrote a favorite piece of mine that I read maybe 15years ago. It was a report of his reactions in the weeks after finding his wife of many years dead in their bed of cancer, I think, on an otherwise typical morning. He wrote so poignantly about his own feelings of being in a bubble, disconnected from others who were engaged in their own lives and, apparently, oblivious to the manner in which the world had changed, now that HIS wife had died. The Sadness. The Anger. ............. I had wanted to go to hear him speak ... It begins later this morning. I don't know if I can. Spent the night with a nasty Dyspepsia and Nausea that seems to be increasing over last few days. I think disappointment can be placed as counterpoise to many other human feelings but among them is gratitude. Can I hold on to a sense of gratitude even if I miss this meeting? .... I suppose, I'll see. .... I was planning to leave M off to visit our youngest grandchild ... Our 3.5 year old cherub, the adorable mascot offer much older cousins. They'll be disappointed, too, if M ends up staying home and taking care of the ailing residues of the First Quarter Player she married in 1965.