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I am not one for big words. In fact, I am fairly confident this is the first time in six years of blogging that I have used this one deliberately: melancholy. Surely I would be better off with the far simpler word — sadness. But sadness isn’t right, and I’ll explain why.
At 00:35 this morning I woke up and saw photos of an event being held on the other side of the world, and that word arrived, uninvited, and stayed.
Not sadness. I want to be precise about that. Overall I am full of gratitude, full of blessing, at relative peace with my path. But melancholy is a different thing. An essay I once read described it well: unlike depression, which is a state of resignation and pain, melancholy carries within it “the pleasure of reflection and contemplation of things we love and long for” and even, the writer argues, an opportunity for “indulgent self-reflection” that we sometimes actively seek out. There is a touch of sweetness to it that pure sadness doesn’t have. That is exactly what I felt at 00:35 this morning, sitting here with my knees absolutely aching, and it is what I am sitting with now.
How you feel is how you feel. Logic can’t hold a candle to emotion in that sense, something I have told clients many times, and apparently still need to remind myself.
Three things have come together to bring me here.
A friend organised a charity event in the UK yesterday. He and many other hard-working people pulled it off beautifully for an amazing organisation I have written about before. I played a very small part, visiting them once with a friend who I thought might want to help, and he did. But as I scrolled through the photos and saw friends of mine in the room, I felt it: a pride in the charity, a pride in my friend, and underneath it, a quiet ache. Under any normal circumstances I would have done anything to be there. I simply can’t.
Closer to home, my wife and I had booked a night at a top hotel to celebrate my upcoming 51st birthday. Disabled access room, everything arranged. But I decided not to go. I have an MRI the morning before, and I know my body well enough now: I cannot predict from one minute to the next whether I will have the energy or the mood to enjoy it. Twelve months ago I travelled to Japan alone to visit my son, still using a walker, still relying on wheelchair assistance at the airport, but I made it and I enjoyed every minute. Nine months ago, my wife had to take our first cruise of a lifetime with my daughter instead of me, because I simply couldn’t make it. Now a night in a hotel feels like too much. That is the arc I am living.
The third thing is smaller, but it landed. A friend came by yesterday with a copy of the Economist, the physical copy, which I love. Pure goodness, pure kindness, not a shadow of anything else intended. But the surprise of it, after I had woken dazed from a sleep that was deeper than I expected, was enough. My body shut down for a significant period afterwards. It has nothing to do with him. It has everything to do with how limited my capacity has become.
So here I am, approaching 51. A year ago, Japan. Nine months ago, a cruise I had to let go. Yesterday, an unexpected knock at the door.
Melancholy is the right word. I am longing for the things I was once able to do, not out of misery but out of reflection: a recognition of what was, a pride in having done it, and a wistfulness for what might have been. My world has shrunk. I am not bitter about it. I have a great deal to look forward to, even now, my whole family together for my birthday, close friends visiting the week after.
But to pretend I feel no loss would be dishonest. And I have learned that honesty about the loss is not weakness: it is the condition of being able to live with it. I am grateful beyond measure. I am also in pain and severely limited. Both of these things are true at the same time, and I am learning that holding them together, without tipping into self-pity, without faking contentment, is its own kind of work.
Melancholy, with its touch of sweetness, is the right place to do that work. Once in a while, at least.
