I feel like I’ve been Rip van Winkled. Like I’m coming out of a cloud bank.

There is no rational explanation for this, although political blogs are in the equation, I swear. No, the insider news isn’t helping to cut me loose, just the opposite. I already know what’s going on, but the emotional charge — which I revel in — sets off an even bigger surge, and I go blind. My father’s in there, too: absent, self-absorbed, quick to anger. Sound like any president you know? I’m serious. The “bad father” archetype is a killer — literally — and makes me feel viciously wronged. I get angry and argue. I strike out at friends. Getting back into reading what amount to dozens of fervent editorials a day (90% of which I mostly agree with) only makes me more crazy.

It was peaking pretty badly over the weekend. Then there was a localized event, a minor encounter in which I felt I was wronged. I over-reacted (just like the old man) in a way that made my wife wince when I told her about it. I couldn’t stop being angry, but I laid it all out again, one more time, and she took my side. Maybe that’s when the hole got poked through. Then something fell away today, and here I am. I feel like I’ve literally been gone somewhere for the last six weeks. Maybe for years.

On Sunday I worked on Web site nuts and bolts, my Web sites, and I did more today. Seems I just didn’t care about the news or read as much of it. For the third or fourth time in the last ten years, I spontaneously forgave my father again. (What I mean is, it just happened.) An old friend in Maryland had a birthday, and I sent him an email. He wrote back, describing the party and people I know. For eight years it’s been nearly impossible for me to think of my faraway friends without paroxysms of pain, confusion, and guilt, but this time was a hoot. I could almost feel like I was there.

And then tonight I picked up my bouzouki. Forget the MP3 with that earlier post, this was like a 90-minute musical whitewater ride.

That instrument has got the devil in it. As soon as I pick it up, it steals my soul and turns it into sound. I have to sit and play and play until I hear enough to get it back, washed and smelling like it’s been dried outside in the breeze.

The woman is letting me in closer now, too. Uncharted territory, but maybe that’s a sign.