Why I Can't Sleep this morning

I've had an idea for a letter to the editor for a week or so now and I haven't had the time to write it. But now I can't sleep so perhaps I'll take the time now.

I used to think I knew what the phrase "darkest before the dawn" or "It's always darkest just before the dawn" meant. But in the same way that I can think I know a colleague at work and then one day, over lunch or during a break, discover that the person I thought I knew was only one narrow view of the whole, I now have a new view of that phrase. Originally I saw two possible meanings. The first was literal; literally it was darkest outside just before the point when the sun rose. The second was metaphorical; life or events seemed darkest or most depressing just before one's circumstances changed for the better.

Now I have a third meaning to add to my repertoire: these days I often wake at or around this hour of the very early morning and wrestle with my thoughts and feelings about my life in this world. I fight off my anxiety about this war that we are in. I attempt to solve problems that arise at work. It usually takes about an hour to wade through all the issues that I am having trouble with and either solve them or pretend that I have found solutions. Then, and only then, am I able to fall back asleep. I sometimes fight the process and I try to ignore the many problems that need "solving"; but I always relent and take them one by one until I can rest again. So I am very anxious and fretful for that hour or so before dawn. Truly for me these days it feels the most depressing in that dark hour before the light returns, when I wrestle with my dark thoughts about this world I find myself living in.

In much the same way that I can think that I know a person and then suddenly realize how little I knew of them, I thought I knew this country, this President, but I find every day how little I really know or knew about either. How is it possible that we Americans could have been so totally fooled or conned? I feel betrayed by President Bush and his tight circle of friends and advisors. I was not aware a year ago that I would need to be fighting for the very survival of my country as I have known it for almost 50 years, fighting for values that I had come to take for granted, that epitomize what it is to be an American: the intelligent use of our government to establish and maintain systems that ensure a basic fairness in how we are all treated, whether it is in the realm of jobs, healthcare or how we deal with other countries. No, now we are all being told that we are "free" to find the healthcare system that best fits our needs with market forces determining what is affordable and what is not. For too many millions of people, the freedom to choose means the "freedom" not to have any insurance at all!