Today was that kind of day...
Language too often fails me. Sadly, the larger my vocabulary, the more difficult I find it to express myself. Some thoughts, some sensations, seem to elude the grasp of all forms of expression.
How do I describe today, for example? I could tell you that it rained last night. I could tell you that it is sunny and breezy, with cumulus clouds and temperatures in the high fifties. That is an accurate description of the weather. I could tell you that I have two classes today, one on programming at 12:40 and one on business policy at 2:20. That is an accurate description of my schedule.
It is not, however, what I want to tell you about today. Or rather, it is not what I want you to understand.
I want to tell you that the rain last night was a slow-building thunderstorm that made my blood feel like cold electricity in my veins and drove my spirit to restless pacing inside my chest. I want you to feel the soul-deep desire to step out into that feral beauty and become a part of it, and to know the sensation of being trapped, held separate from it. I want you to understand the desperation of lying in bed, watching the tree outside the window dance in the wind, blinded every time the lightning strikes, with your thoughts chasing circles in your mind until you pray for sleep in self-defense.
I want to tell you how it feels to wake up suddenly the next morning, after only a few hours of sleep, to the harsh buzz of an alarm clock and the knowledge that the infernal device has interrupted something that you've already lost the threads of. To look out the window at the sun reflecting off the puddles in the parking lot and to know that you will spend the entire day in a concrete box where the windows are covered with dull gray blinds to keep the natural light from creating a glare on the computer monitors.
I want you to walk outside and feel the breeze on your skin; cool, damp, smelling like clear water. It feels clean, pure, and you want to stand in the sun with your head tilted back, eyes closed, arms out to your sides. To let it wash through you and lift away every dark, heavy piece of yourself, even if only for a moment... but you don't have the time to spare. You're already behind schedule because you turned off the alarm and tried unsuccessfully to catch the last, unraveling piece of whatever it interrupted.
I want you to see the bus stop at the college; the army of cars stacked together like crayons in a box. The deeper blue reflection of the sky on the drainage pond at the edge of the parking lot - how you wish you had the time to take a picture, take a moment, to touch the water just once. You can almost feel how cold it is, just by looking at it. I want you to see the pretty girl in the sequined sweater waiting for the bus. How she sparkles in the cool, bright air, and the way that sight momentarily lifts your spirits and makes you thank her silently even as you compliment her.
Can you see it?
Can you feel it?
Do you understand?
... ... ...
Are you even reading anymore?
All of these impressions, sensations, emotions occur almost instantaneously, many simultaneously, and are so much more complex than this brief narrative can explain. And yet, it takes so much longer to explain, however poorly, than it took to experience.
This is at least part of the source of my frustration. Everyone keeps telling me that I need to talk about the things that bother me, or write about my thoughts. Journal. Blog. See a counselor. Everyone assures me that it will help. But how can it help if I cannot find the means to express what I think or feel in such a way that it becomes real to another person? How do you express a thought that is three-quarters sensation? How do you express a sensation when the only word you have appeals to the wrong sense? The wrong perspective? How do you explain a philosophy to someone whose view is so different from your own that the very words you need to use sound like a foreign language?
To borrow a concept from a favorite movie, how do you describe a rainbow to a dog?
Language too often fails me. Art is beyond my ability. So is telepathy. And silence is not the solution.
Where, then, does that leave me?