Routine

In what can I trust?

In my senses? They can cheat. They can be tampered with. They are not reliable.

In my emotions? They are vacillating, blown by the slightest breeze of circumstance.

In my mind? It can also be tampered with. A hundred influences playing for control at any time. Whispers in the dark. It is not reliable.

In my strength? It can fail in an instant. Invisible assassins assail it from every side. I am not strong.

In my possessions? They are not me. They do not satisfy. They break and are stolen or damaged. They are chaff.

In my friends? They are dispersed. I rarely see them. They are busy. They are troubled enough on their own. Or they are distant, not interested or capable of deep relations.

In my church? What is that? What is trustworthy in a human attempt to be Godly? It is corrupted, shallow, self-serving, and too busy.

In my hobbies? These are pass-times. Business for the hands and mind. Torches in the dark to stave off the hellhounds.

In family? They are bothered, exasperated, incapable of understanding, and confronted with the urgencies of life. They don't have time or energy for failings.

In work? It is usury. Squeeze my skills and usefulness from me, discard the rind.

In study? My understanding is drivel.

In routine? Yes there is safety. There is movement. Like pacing the cell, but it is movement. It is sequence. First this, now do this. In routine I can move. In unchanging life-sucking dullness of routine I can progress from one sun to the next, one moon to the next. It marks time. There is nothing else. Do this, next to this. No change. Consistency. It keeps the body fed, cleaned, rested, the mouths happy. Zombie-like it marches on. It selects the appropriate behaviors, faces for the appropriate moments. The suits for the occasions. It does not ask how I feel. It just moves. Next this, then this. Eventually the pacing will wear away the very flesh from my bones, the edge from my mind, the fire from my will. But it will progress. It is movement.