Tuesday

Ah, was so bored mid-way through the day, that once the headache abated, I considered going into work.  I ended up sleeping instead.  Still in that disorienting no-where place.  I don't think it's depression (though, I suppose it could be) more that it's just been January (my least favorite month), and gloomy, and I feel in-between, and lethargic.

Got up feeling like someone had beat my forearms with a metal pole on a cold day, it's fading now, but that's the arthritis. (I never find the right single adjective to describe pain to fill out the forms in the doctor's office.  Would that be "sharp?" "dull?" I don't know.  It is what it is.  And it kinda' depends if I'm still or if I move or try to do anything, changes the quality and intensity.)  I was testing potatoes, made a stew on Sunday, so that could be the reason.

The book is a good candidate for a discussion group.  The whole idea of the nature of blindness.  Why is there one person who can see? The anarchy in the asylum (among a minority, but they took control over everything), what happens when social order breaks down? (And what use were the stolen items or money in the asylum? Or what good was money when the financial systems had collapsed, infrastructure had failed, and anarchy ruled? The stolen goods burned along with everything else.) What fills in the vacuum?  Something will, so do we do that consciously or do we let entropy win by our indecision? How does a democracy function? What keeps those who would be a good leader from stepping forward to fill the void? The person most qualified to lead held back initially, though she takes de facto leadership of her ward, and of the initial group of inhabitants to the asylum (the woman who lit the fire was in the initial group struck by blindness, but a later addition to the asylum.)  In what ways do societies break down? And the different ways people cope to survive in that state.  How people adapt to a new norm.  Where does hope lie? How does it die? What does resignation look like? (Which makes me think of Existentialism.) What does it mean to be free? Why do we cling to the known hell once the doors have been opened and the guards have fled? What do we fear? What does it mean to live?

It's a good book.  I have about 75 pages left.