Ferdinand Olivier: Coping-stone (1823)

"I'd rather be crazy on my terms …"

Most people seem incapable of mustering a coping strategy, for we do not live all that strategically. We exist episodically, hoping against hope that we will somehow cope with even the more extraordinary stresses our times expose us to. I might insist that I've never seen a time like this, but I've survived stressful times before. Those times sure seemed dire at the time, and only in retrospect do they seem tame by any comparison. They terrified me to what I then understood to be my core. I didn't know beforehand if I could cope with those tensions and stresses. The tenacious unknowingness of those times caused the bulk of the damage. Others were more wounded than I, though it was not in any way a credit to anything I necessarily contributed. I proved fortunate under those circumstances, though I felt anything but lucky at the time. One never knows or, certainly, I never seemed to know at any point. Later, perhaps through speculation, I sometimes made sense of such experiences, though I suspect my stories about those times better qualify as fiction than accurate reportage. I chalk them up to one of my more prominent CopingTactics.

I write my cares away, though writing more often amplifies my cares than mollifies them. Writing is my default CopingTactic, rather like directing the expectant father to focus on boiling water, not because that water's especially needed but because it might occupy him away from obsessing over the impending birth and keep him out from underfoot. Such distractions prove especially popular when one is assuming some fresh obligations. Dread too easily overwhelms one in such situations. It's not shameful to flee the brunt of any overly intense experience. I try to remember to look away, even though I secretly fear that my looking might be keeping calamity at bay. I cannot realistically stare into any face of any impending evil without occasionally blinking. If only for recharging purposes, I might chase down a parallel but more benign obsession for a change. What once energized me? What have I been neglecting so I could maintain my primary concern? What do I feel compelled to learn?

Besides writing, sourcing has served as a reliable CopingTactic for me. When The Muse and I were exiled, discovering fresh sources eased my sense of dislocation. I felt lost most of the time, but I found respite in finding some rare seasonal vegetable, for instance. Stumbling upon a particular sort of mushroom or a shipment of fresh green garbanzos or favas could make more than my day. This made my sense of dislocation go away. I'd feel masterful in something, however modest, for a while. This way, I'd inject little dopamine boosts into my exile-beleaguered brain. I would gleefully try to repeat such discoveries every time I ventured out shopping. I eventually had a list of old reliables where I'd experienced the magic before. These didn't always yield what I intended, but between them, they increased my chances of success in any single search.

These searches seem best when not engaged in very deliberately, almost inadvertently. Like yesterday, when I stumbled into a dandy distraction. It being Passover week, I wondered how I might find a bowl of Matzo Ball Soup, one of my all-time favorite concoctions. Out here in the hinterlands overlooking the center of the universe, near the tail end of logistics, ingredients sometimes seem scarce, especially those commonly found in ethnic enclaves. Not every place in this country carries a matzo meal during Passover. It might be unthinkable for every store in Manhattan not to stock some then, but places that have it in Southeastern Washington prove to be awfully thin to non-existent. The Muse and I spent an odd hour trying almost every grocery store here without finding even a hint of Matzo. The closest we came was when a Safeway clerk told us to look on a top shelf in aisle eleven, where we found Monster Mash cereal. Close, but no prize!

Still, the search proved to be a useful CopingTactic. Finding seemed optional, especially when The Muse decided that she could make her own unleavened Matzo, and did. That opened up a whole other adventure that kept us both away from doom-scrolling for most of the entire ensuing evening. These small adventures provide the sanity we crave through these days that too often seem everything but sane. To practice scanning grocery store aisles for something after trying to properly categorize that search. Should Matzo be stocked in the Ethnic Foods aisle adjacent to soy sauce and burrito fixings? Or might they have been parsed as more of a cracker? Next to all those curious gluten-free alternative foods in the so-called Health Food aisle? Even when the search reduces to none of the above, the alternative coping mechanism serves its noble purpose; even if that purpose might turn out to have been reproving you're still insane. I'd rather be crazy on my terms than anybody else's, especially our incumbent's.

©2025 by David A. Schmaltz - all rights reserved

Tags: #CHope , #PureSchmaltz