It was about halfway through undergrad that I formulated the notion of “the black cloud.” I don’t know if it was related to weather – the cold, humid, rainy winter of the Deep South might have lent itself to that – and I certainly didn’t have the toolbox to characterize what I now recognize was a gigantic banner hung out to say “DEPRESSION HERE”. All I knew is that there was something in the very air and earth of the place that reverberated with a constant refrain of “this place is not for the likes of you.”
That, ultimately, was the difference between my struggles at National Geographic and the late struggles around Silly Con Valley. Make no mistake: NGS had some really rough stretches, and I did rage-quit more than once (only to turn up a day or two later and resume as if nothing had happened). But if DC and Northern Virginia were never the “home on day one” the way Nashville felt, they certainly never radiated “you don’t belong here” the way my undergrad did…or the way Silly Con Valley would come to after 2012. And I had my gang around me shoulder to shoulder. There were bleak times, there was grief, there were challenges and difficulties and some problems I would never get to solve, but there was never the black cloud.
But then, there was no black cloud here either. Not at first. My first eight years in NorCal varied from highly adequate to quite awesome to absolute perfection, and while the second-biggest mistake of my life did put me down a hole for a couple of years, it was still a work problem and a worry over my future rather than the kind of existential crisis the black cloud implied. And I battled through the obstacles and kept going best I could. And then the black cloud returned with a vengeance sometime around late 2012, such that by the time work turned to shit three months later and stayed there, it was easy to be swamped, be overwhelmed, wonder how it was ever going to be possible to escape my job, escape the Logan’s Run atmosphere of Silly Con Valley, escape a place and a time that rejected the notion that there were, you know, other people. And I was just getting close to sorting that out and digging out…and then the election happened.
So it’s been a long time getting out from under this particular cloud. Over five years, if I’m being honest, and five years where I struggled to grow as a person. Five years of running to stand still, five years on defense, five years just trying to stay alive. But not all clouds are bad, as I learned during one of those cognitive behavioral therapy exercises where you breathe in the good color and exhale the bad one. And I was purging all that bad orange by breathing in…gray. Fog. And visualizing myself being quiet and safe and at peace…on the cliffs above the Pacific shore. And I realized that all I want from the black cloud is to replace it with the gray one.
The gray cloud has many advantages over the black one. The gray cloud is shelter, keeping away the harsh light and prying eyes. It’s a blanket, cozy in all directions. It’s cool temperature encouraging my new favorite wardrobe with the heavy work shirt and the slubby T-shirt and the wool flannel ball cap. But it’s not just climate, it’s a mindset. A way of thinking that approves of one long Imperial pint of ale nursed all evening. Or quietly assembling the pieces of the meal kit to more-or-less cook dinner. Or to move all the social media apps off the phone and take time to just read books, and listen to podcasts, and try to learn the patience that’s required when you can’t just set the world to rights. The gray cloud rewards quiet, patience, calm…baseball instead of football, the minors instead of the majors. Empty bars, quiet pubs, nighttime walks. Early mornings before the crowds arrive. A compact phone, without work or social media apps, and a monochrome Kindle, both with ridiculous long battery life, and a mechanical watch that isn’t doing notifications or fitness tracking or asking to be charged every night.
The gray cloud reminds me of being in Ireland, or England, or some place with a long view of history and a more human scale. A pace and a perspective more suited to being mindful of the world around you, yet equally suited to leaving the world beyond your grasp safely out of reach and not letting it intrude. The sort of thing that makes me think that when I go, maybe reduce me to ashes and then scatter them somewhere on the San Mateo coast in the fog belt where it can be 56 degrees with marine layer…forever.
Wouldn’t that be something.