Against all rational choice of will, an old hunger in my heart returns

By David McElroy · July 8, 2021

I feel the beating of my heart in a terrible way tonight.

This hasn’t happened for awhile. I don’t remember when the madness last showed up. But the physical beating of my heart seems loud. It’s as though something powerful were contained within the walls of my heart — thrashing around, trying to break out, ready to explode.

For weeks now — maybe months — I’ve been so firm. So logical. So focused. And then this insane compulsion suddenly returned in a form that threatens to overwhelm me. Again.

It’s not a heart attack. At least not the physical kind. It’s something different. An inner attack which is emotional rather than physical. But in some ways it seems even more dangerous than a heart attack.

I can’t possibly still have love for her. That wouldn’t make any sense. She doesn’t love me. And it’s been years. It shouldn’t matter. And yet this obsession — this need, this hunger, this longing — returns against my will and leaves me feeling powerless to stop the overwhelming tides which rush over me.

Romantic love is a peculiar form of insanity, but it can be emotional salvation as well. When it forces its way into your heart, it’s impossible to say whether it’s a path that leads to heaven or to hell. Even when it saves us, though, it’s still irrational.

And even though I want — with all of my being — to hate this irrational feeling, I know very well how much I need it.

None of this is a new thought for me. I’ve gone through periods when I felt compelled to write about it frequently. Here’s a random example from a few years ago, when I said that love is part obsession, part reality and part madness. (I just read that again. It’s all still true tonight.)

Love and madness are remarkably similar — and it seems that it’s hard to find intense love without a corresponding bit of madness to go along with it. A touch of insanity might seem like a high price to pay for experiencing the intensity of love, but if they have to go hand in hand — and I think they do — I’d rather deal with some bit of madness and feel intense love than to live in complete sober sanity and fail to experience the loving connection with another person that makes me feel more alive than anything else.

I wrote something many years ago — which I can’t find right now — that touches on the experience of walking the line between sanity and madness. For a long time, I’ve seen myself as someone who lives on a razor-thin line that runs between the two.

If I’m too far on the side of sober sanity, I don’t feel alive. I don’t feel the intensity of love, creativity, beauty and truth which I crave. I know not to go too far toward the madness, though, because I know it would destroy me.

For months, I’ve been completely on the side of sober sanity. Too far, in fact. Tonight, something has pulled me back to the very edge of that powerful and scary line. I don’t know how. I don’t want to go too far, but I also don’t want to pull back to the safety of numbness.

I know this line represents where my best life is. I know that walking this thin line is where I’m happiest and most productive and most creative. I know all of that — in both my head and my heart.

But while this crazy beating in my chest seems to bang out a tempo that the whole world should be able to hear, I also know it’s a line I can’t walk alone. Not forever.

It’s sheer madness that’s brought me to this point again. I didn’t see it coming. But I’m back out here on this razor-thin edge one more time — and I’m waiting for the right soul to join me.

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I’m seeing a lot of simplistic and dishonest explanations right now for the current rioting in France. Those on the populist far right claim it’s all about Muslim immigrants to France disrupting the culture. Their message is that this sort of thing is going to happen in the U.S. unless “we defend the border.” On the far left, socialists and their fellow travelers claim the riots are all about wealthy people in France not paying enough taxes, resulting in cuts to government services. The truth is far more complicated, but it’s rooted in the decline of population growth in Europe. There simply aren’t enough young workers paying into the tax system anymore, so cuts in social services were inevitable. There is genuine cultural tension as more and more people immigrate from other countries, but government cuts to education and other services are even more important to what’s happening. The situation is complicated, so don’t let dishonest people with U.S. political agendas tell you that it happens to support whatever they were already promoting for partisan reasons.

Here’s another reason to appreciate the cats in your life: New research involving 93 countries found that places with more cats per person also tended to have happier people. The researchers say the finding fits with previous evidence that living with pets can reduce loneliness and stress while providing companionship, emotional attachment and social support. The study doesn’t prove that cats cause greater happiness, but it certainly adds to the evidence that sharing your home — and your life — with a cat might be good for you.

The company that owns Facebook and Instagram is heavily promoting its new AI-based software assistant called Muse, but people who are using it as it was designed are incredibly foolish. An early adopter of the software discovered that a few days ago when he advertised an item for sale on Facebook Marketplace — and he inadvertently gave Muse full authority to act on his behalf. The software agreed to a lowball offer made by another Facebook user and then gave that man the home address of the man for whom he was an agent. The software told the buyer that the seller was home and waiting for him. When the buyer showed up and waited angrily, the would-be buyer left an angry review for the man. And this angry man had the seller’s home address. It was only well after that that the software reported what it had done and admitted it had made a mistake. I won’t be putting that much power into the hands of any software. I think anyone who agrees to such terms is a fool. And the software’s user agreement says you’re responsible for purchases the software makes in your name. Nope.

Meet my new girlfriend. Her name is Meg. And she’s my little sweetheart. A couple of months ago, a neighbor across the street told me about a new stray in the neighborhood that she and I were both soon feeding. The cat had been very skittish about contact and she had a lot of scabs and parasites in her fur, but a trip to the vet last week revealed that she was otherwise in good health. The vet estimates her to be 1 to 2 years old. I named her for Meg Murry, the 13-year-old protagonist of Madeleine L’Engle’s wonderful book, “A Wrinkle in Time.” (Please read the book. Don’t watch the horrible movie.) Since we lost Lucy almost a year ago, it seems appropriate that we finally have a new little girl to join the household. She’s already captured my heart, but Alex, Oliver and Sam aren’t there quite yet.

There’s nothing socially acceptable that’s as dangerous as drinking alcohol. Most people grow up being told to “drink responsibly” — and all of us see people abusing this drug in one way or another — but the truth is that drinking alcohol is always a terrible risk. The alcohol in these drinks is toxic and the human liver has to work hard to filter the toxins out. What most people don’t realize is that alcohol is classified as a known carcinogen by the World Health Organization — because of the well-established connection between imbibing and various cancers. Many people have taken refuge behind the idea that light or moderate drinking might be safe, but a new study shows that drinking even one drink a day increases the risks of 10 types of cancer. When I was a teen-ager, I looked around and saw the negative effects that this behavior had on a lot of people and decided not to start drinking, so I’ve never even tried this poison. The evidence keeps piling up that I was lucky to have come to that conclusion early.

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