Absent Demons
(February 21, 2011) |
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| What is this vague but unrelenting discontent? When did
ambition quietly slip away and leave gentle despair in its
place? Talents languish undeveloped waiting for tomorrow as
tomorrow plods wearily on to become today, then fades
unexploited into yesterday. Aspirations molder away like
once favored toys now tossed into a corner to lie neglected
and forgotten. Where did this deep, abiding, banked anger
come from? Will it ever leave?
Now, after a reunion,
there is the unsettling memory of an old friend smiling in
happy surprise: “I think that's the first time I've ever
heard you really laugh.” Seeing me regularly for five and
often six days I week, how could he not have heard me laugh?
I'm left wondering if that could possibly be true. He never
heard me really laugh even once in three years? If it is
true, why should it be?
For there are no disturbing
memories that trouble my waking hours; no demons come
unbidden in the night to disrupt my dreamless sleep – if I
finally do go to sleep. I only know that I want something
that I realize is obtainable but that I cannot muster enough
caring to reach for and grasp. Why is that? When did spring
come and go without my caring or even acknowledging it?
I have always loved the smell of spring as the earth
awakened and renewed itself. Now spring has come and gone,
summer is here and the rose bushes remain untended. I've
come to understand what this misquoted bit of Shakespeare
means: “How can it be summer when I am in the winter of my
discontent?” Not even reuniting with old friends can ease
this malaise. Bleak and barren is what I feel, and suicide
is not an option.
So I will bear it as I have borne
it for all these long, weary years. And only a few people
will ever realize – as I now do – that, although I smile a
lot, I seldom ever really laugh. But then... there are no
demons. |
 By Thurman P. Woodfork
Copyright 2001
About
Author...
Thurman P. Woodfork (Woody) spent his
Air Force career as a radar repairman in places as disparate as
Biloxi, Mississippi; Cut Bank, Montana; Tin City, Alaska; Rosas,
Spain and Tay Ninh, Vietnam. In Vietnam, he was assigned to
Detachment 7 of the 619th Tactical Control Squadron, a Forward Air
Command Post located on Trai Trang Sup. Trang Sup was an Army
Special Forces camp situated about fifty miles northwest of Saigon
in Tay Ninh province, close to the Cambodian border.
After Vietnam, Woody remained in the Air Force for nine more years.
Visit
Thurman P. Woodfork's site for more information | |
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