Yesterday we, the Robinsons, two of us, suffered a disaster within our home. So horrible I cannot hint at it, however aroused your curiosity. It lasted about an hour. Finally normality resumed, we retired to our comfort zones (VR the easy chair, RR the couch), opened some kind of reading matter, and silence descended.
Fortunately this was a shared event. Mutual support was available. After about an hour I looked up and was struck by the tranquillity on the face of my wife of 63 years. The sense of peace. One would never have known…
But was this pleasure? Certainly it was relief, but for relief to exist badness must have preceded it. Relief may be a new absence of pain. But that’s not quite a workable definition of pleasure.
Whatever it was, the state endured. As long as an hour or two. Does pleasure endure? How long can one look at a landscape and maintain a state of sharp and – perhaps – unexpected pleasure? Doesn’t the impact begin to fade? More often than not, pleasure is only truly recognised afterwards. At the time we may not be given to introspection.
I tried to raise these points with VR but she wasn’t having any. She’s more pragmatical than I am. Yet again I forgot about pills at the right time of day. Life re-asserted itself.
First, let me say how sorry I am that you had this disaster. As we say in certain neighborhoods in the U.S., it sucks.
ReplyDeleteInteresting thoughts about pleasure and relief. Although they have similar aspects, I guess I'd see them separately, even though they might share some key characteristics. Relief definitely comes after pain or unpleasantness. Pleasure stands alone. It is kind of like primary and secondary colors. Pleasure is definitely Blue. Relief might be purple.
Colette: Relief is characterised by several deep intakes of breath. It tends to be of short duration. Pleasure lasts longer and is mostly of lower intensity; just as well otherwise we'd float away like balloons.
DeleteOY! At this stage of life it seems that disasters, gigantic or minute, seem to be part of our live's schedule. Whether you are replacing, removing, altering existing body parts or bits of your home, vehicle or social circle, it all seems to be a disaster of one scale or another. Perhaps relief is simply numbness dealing with the chaos. Chaos is perpetual here. Any bits of normal aren desirable!
ReplyDeleteSandi: As to replacing body parts I'm on a waiting list for refurbished imagination. Regularly taking MRI scans to check how well I can lie. But don't believe a word I say.
DeleteA thankfully long time ago, I had what we still and forever will refer to as the great dental disaster (oral surgery, open wound inside mouth for three months, painkillers that barely kicked in, the lot) and I learned the ultimate relief, which is the state we find ourselves in once a tooth ache is gone, shaped by the fact that we cannot even remember the actual ache. And in my case, tooth ache was putting it mildly. Very mildly.
ReplyDeleteSabine: Our disaster was sharp, of short duration, and - in retrospect - poignant. Also unmentionable.
ReplyDeleteIt seems we might be distantly bonded. My first cancer op concerned a buccal sulsus and now, almost two years later, the interior of my mouth feels like something fleshy that belongs to someone else. I still am able to sing, though. Thus life is definitely worth living.
Delightful writing.
ReplyDeleteMikeM: More irony, since the writing is directed towards a horrible experience. But thanks for that
DeleteRelief is the cessation of pain or discomfort or fear or something unwanted. it's a pleasurable feeling, yes, but not the same as pleasure. Pleasure is the good feeling that arises when you see something or experience something that you enjoy, it's kin to happiness. Relief, pleasure, happiness I think are unsustainable as they are attached to certain experiences. Contentment, on the other hand, is sustainable stemming as it does from the collective experiences and environment of your life. That doesn't mean a person who is content with their life won't have blips and unpleasant experiences at times. People strive for happiness when they should be striving for contentment.
ReplyDeleteellen abbott: I agree with most of this but "ah hae mi doots" about contentment. To me - and I may well be wrong on this - it suggests a long-term state, conceivably lasting months if not years. And, as such, it seems to come perilously close to inertia. A disinclination to ask questions, to test long-held beliefs, to accept things at face value, even to distrust change. Blame my 44½ years in what many regard as the sordid pursuit of answers as a journalist. I am told by many that it is impolite to base conversation (on social occasions) on curiosity and may be the reason why I'm rarely invited to parties.
DeleteOh, and I wanted to relate to you a story. On a wilderness canoe camping trip with friends, we each were to provide some bit of entertainment every night after dinner and clean up. My friend Renee read a passage from a book which unfortunately I don't remember the title or author but the passage was about how we remember things and what things we remember. The author related a story of a camping trip where many things went wrong and years later remembering it he would tell his listeners that (paraphrased): "we almost died. it was the best camping trip we ever had!" I think it wasn't the best because of all the adversity but that they survived to tell the tale. Or maybe it was the adversity that made it memorable.
ReplyDeleteellen abbott: To re-tell an unpleasant event in straightforward detail can risk appearing lugubrious - especially if one drops into the habit of regular re-tellings. It can sound like a complaint, like whining. Better by far is to convert it into a comical story with the narrator adopting a detached voice, shrugging off pain and discomfort, even implying "I probably deserved it." That way the audience may be forced into sympathising, saying, in effect, "Oh no, how horrible for you." Or would you regard this as manipulative?.
ReplyDeleteI think something like this lies at the centre of this anecdote.