It occurred to me Thursday, while driving between my newspapers, that I've not taken the time to consider my trauma over the past couple of years.
I haven't suffered the trauma of losing a loved one, at least recently. Nor have I been in a terrible crash or been beaten up. Hell, I haven't even dated Amber Heard.
But I have suffered.
Now I have to figure out how I deal with it.
As I drove with radio off -- drive time is great thinking time -- I thought about how I've not addressed this. I'm not going to play the game of comparing tragedies. I'm not going to do the Monty Pythong thing where distinguished gentlemen argue who had it worst.
As I've climbed from the bottom hole of my troubles, I tried to keeping moving forward -- even if a centimeter at a time. While doing that, I brushed off indignities, depression, panic, anxiety. I almost had my first anxiety attack Wednesday yet I'm fully housed, paid well and love my job. That's likely what led to me considering the trauma issue.
Remember, I consider myself the luckiest man in the world. The breaks I've received, the help handed to me, new friends, all the blessings a person can receive and I've counted and stored each in my brain.
But I've also played that Wisconsin man thing -- probably more than Wisconsin -- where I wave off pain. "It's nothing," I've said to myself thousands of times over the last three years.
I'm reminded of Homer Simpson's advice to his children: Bury your feelings way down deep inside you, where you'll never hear from them again.
I'm working on my feelings -- both of them.
Peace unto the Ukraine and peace and feelings unto you my brothers and sisters.