Pocket of silence (II)

Shakespeare sonnet 8: Music to hear. 20"x20". Oil on canvas

When my computer crashed a week ago, and it became clear that the problem is serious, I suddenly experienced something I expected least: a distinct feeling of relief.

Of course, it wasn't a catastrophe by any stretch of imagination: I have a reliable and convenient back-up, and the Mac is still under three-year warranty; it even didn't really "disconnect" me (because of all those other little gadgets, and Eugene's desktop). So there were really no reasons to panic or worry, but that still doesn't explain wherefore the relief...  After all, nobody forces me to use the laptop even when it is functional, right?


In fact, between the iPad and the desktop, I could still do almost all the things I was doing and planning to do on the Mac; it's just that the overall workflow would be just somewhat more cumbersome. But since it was clear that the return of the Mac is a matter of several days, I felt its temporary absence as a good excuse to allow myself a vacation from all those things, from minor household chores (like online banking) to adding new work to my catalog and updating online galleries and G+ albums, to writing all the posts I'd planned for this blog. In other words, I took the crash as an excuse to slow down and shut up: my days were now filled with painting, and reading, and thinking, and listening. In short, really good days.

Which apparently means that the need for a "pocket of silence" I mentioned a couple of weeks ago on this blog is more urgent that I had realized before. It took a computer crash and this unexpected feeling of relief to show me the depth of this need. So, even though the computer is back, alive and kicking, I'll take a couple more days (at least till the end of this week) of silence.