Vacant

The thing with being numb or emotionally withdrawn is that even the feeling of nothingness is a unique, definable experience.  It's a state of apathy and nonchalance where every stimulus is deflected and you coast by on auto-pilot until the fog passes.  I know that feeling intimately, and this is different.

I noticed this last week when walking to Wanda's (paraphrasing Boro, tortured artists find solace in their work, and some of us find comfort in our munchies) and broke into an enthusiastic run halfway there because I was overcome by the anticipation of pies and butter tarts.  This is more like an emotional vacancy where any available feeling expands to fill the void, coming across so unreasonably intensely that even if I recognize its ridiculousness, I feel powerless to do anything but let them wash over me.  Every day at work is a tide of joy, despair, hopelessness, excitement, boredom and yearning. 

I like to think that I've always been fairly self-aware and when I return home exhausted at the end of the day, I know it's not a physical exhaustion that puts me directly to sleep.  The one thing that normalizes these emotions is seeing my dog wait for me by the window as I pull into the driveway and greet me as I walk through the door.  To have her clumsily step over me and curl against my leg then hearing her snoring contentedly, or watch as she closes her eyes, stops and catches a first whiff of a scent out in the ravine before she frantically attempts to chase it down are the moments that keep me...

...I suddenly don't know how to finish that sentence.