Some days I don't want to work. Just watch episodes of Buffy the Vampire Slayer on Hulu and let my consciousness float about six inches outside of my skull. Lethargy is to be expected from time to time, I suppose; but it is unwelcome right now, as it coincides with an attempt to cut back on the meds and wean myself (with the doctor's approval, of course) off such large doses of three kinds of antidepressants. And I'm kicking myself for letting someone else's existential angst get into my head. Now I'm worried it won't go away, and I'll be stuck in here again, airtight and silent. In limbo. Weightless. Open the pod bay doors, Hal. . . . But there's a little bird on a stump outside my camper, singing "stu-pid! stu-pid! stu-pid!"

And yes, I wonder why no one knows, cares, or learns about the Subjunctive Mood in schools anymore. It's a beautiful, wishful Mood -- as opposed to the stark, declarative realities of the Indicative Mood ("The rain in Spain stays mainly in the plain") or the dictatorial barking of the Imperative Mood ("Get yer brolly out of my face!"). The Subjunctive Mood deals in speculation, possibility, and fantasy -- if only I were twenty-five again! Eat up, little one, lest you be hungry later. I insist that he sing "As Time Goes By" for me. . . . We unconsciously use it in set phrases, without consideration of our true meaning ("If I were a rich man," "be that as it may," "come what may," etc.) -- without consideration that we are delving into the unchartered realms of the unknown, the unreal, the unpredictable. If I were you, I would dive into a subjunctive pool of clear blue water, and let myself drift under the surface, airless, like the mermaids at Weeki Wachee Springs St. James wrote about last week.

It begins with the face-freeze. This is a tightness around the temples and down to the jaws, on which smiles may appear, yes, although the light might not be quite illuminated in the eyes. And with the face-freeze comes the creeping lethargy. And it is oh so lazy. It will insist on leaving the dishes in the sink and won't take the trash out, seemingly wanting to wallow in some sort of torpor. I spent the last two days in bed, only getting up to feed the animals and myself. I only got up today because we were out of dog food. I don't want to write. I have two unpublished hubs leering at me in my account page. I'm reminded of that Berryman poem, "He Resigns" -- "I don't think I will sing anymore;/ ever."

The English language has woven so many foreign textures into the heavy tapestry of its history that you would think we would have retained the use of the Subjunctive, especially with its parallels in French; but this beautiful Mood gave way to auxiliary uniformity with the substitution of the utilitarian "may" and "should" -- thus dispensing with the need to conjugate ("meddle with") the verbs themselves. "Should it rain tomorrow, I'll probably just stay in bed again"; "whatever may happen, we'll always have Paris" (or was it Marseilles? Damn, I forget). We wouldn't say "If it rain tomorrow," would we? Or "if I be angry tomorrow, you had better run, boy"? Those would be the correct forms of the sensuous Subjunctive.  Gone.  I feel a blues riff in my head.

The last time was the worst.  It has been worse each time it happens; last time it froze my face, then my brain, then my heart.  After that, I don't remember much. It is a condition to be avoided at all costs, and I can't believe I gambled with my own wellbeing like this.  Last time, there were months of darkness, adrift.  I don't think I will sing.  I took myself to the most remote place I could find, my past, just to hear the silence muffle my ears.  Blasted heath, Lear's self-indulgent stream of flagellant abuse; cornered in the wasteland surrounded by cold air only.  No exit, Jean-Paul; no refund, no return.

I might have stayed away.  I might have lingered in Subjunctive possibility.  But I didn't.  My being here now indicates my present determination never to go back there.  "Might" is the past form of "may"; my Indicative Mood signals my declaration of independence and my resolve to make declarative statements only, for a while, until I can sing again. 

If it come to nothing -- my resolve, that is -- if it come to nothing, be subjected to another bout in the ring with black amber, petrified, I don't know what I will do. 

That's a future speculation I do not wish to make right now.  Emily Dickinson called "possibility" "a fairer house than prose" -- yes, but only when the black fog is not wreathed outside the door.

So, you see, when the Subjunctive Mood almost disappeared from the English language, we were left with only two, and neither of them suit me just now, either.