The Jeopardy

I might be having what we call a Good Day. These come unannounced and never for any particular reason that I can see. It may be that one has rested more conscientiously than usual, but reward doesn't necessarily follow – resting is something we do because things get very bad if we don’t. It is as though one is at the mercy of some capricious authority who decides on a whim to give a day’s holiday. If he (for it is a he) is in a good mood it may be more, you don’t know. The day, if it is very good, can bring with it a terrible euphoria of the kind I believe is sometimes experienced by long-term prisoners when they have been deprived of natural light. An open window, a line of birdsong can do it. The euphoria is dangerous for two reasons: there is an overwhelming impulse to make up for lost time and one initiates and commits to all kinds of projects and engagements that will later have to be cancelled or managed with great difficulty; and in this heightened state it is possible to believe that the long illness is over and freedom has come. Deliverance. The comedown is terrible.

I am being careful.