Reading lately, and re-reading, Sam. Johnson's essays from the Rambler, Adventurer, and Idler. How I love the man and his thought; despite, maybe even because of, his inability to think outside the box of the Christian religion.

I have all the fashionable psychic ailments, including SAD, Seasonal Affective Disorder, with a vengeance and in spades. Not only do I get depressed when, in the northern temperate zone, the sun sinks towards the horizon in the late summer, and nearly desperate at the winter solstice; but when she comes back in the spring, I grow correspondingly exhilerated, manic even, at the summer solstice. So, lately, here on the Tropic of Cancer, past the spring equinox, the nearly vertical angle of the sun at midday fills me with exuberant elation; I have a tendency to skip and to dance when I walk, and a song seems always on my lips; and I can't think why I should be, but I am happy. Of course there are things, like finding permanent lodging, and getting back into school, which I must take seriously and put some work into; but nothing--not even the world situation and the fascist horrors of the Bush-Halliburton "war" abroad and prison-state at home--can wipe that smile off my face.