“I hope you’re okay these days,” a friend writes. “I’m only surviving by NOT watching the news and NOT reading anything at all about politics. I mean, it all reaches me anyway, but I am not agitating myself hourly. Et tu?”

My reply exfoliates – to almost missive-length – so why not?

Controlling mental consumption is a coping strategy. Emotional no less than bodily health depends on prudent intake. Susceptible to depression, I’ve got to cut back on horror lest my heart stop. As master-chef T.S. Eliot put it, “Human kind cannot bear very much reality.”

I’d avert my gaze from our national catastrophe if I could; poetry’s so much pleasanter. Only, I can’t. No more can we quit the hospital waiting room while our beloved undergoes surgery, though we’re useless and there’s nothing to be done. We must bear witness. We can’t do anything else.

I need to know. But my brain also needs to breathe. I chivvy myself to celebrate my blessings and look on the bright side. Visitors to this space overhear me doing it. I prod myself to vary topics lest I bore. Isn’t spreading cheer our moral obligation in a cheerless hour? To the observation “Everything sucks,” “You can say that again” is not an amiable response.

Two strategies I’ve found helpful: forbearance and despair.

I take my news, as Mithridates his poison, in smallish doses to inure myself. Overdo and I’m done for. Having browsed the headlines for a sense of the villainies du jour, I defer to experts to interpret. Paul Krugman, Heather Cox Richardson, Tom Friedman, and Josh Marshall are among my constant professors in their respective disciplines; I try not to skip a class. Not only do these sages explain cogently, they write winningly, which for me is a precondition of attendance. Mucking through drab prose is beyond my strength.

Though countless others are yammering these days, I mostly clap my ears. Yelps, groans, and rants add little to my understanding. I try not to yammer too much myself. Morality’s my beat, not moaning. I half-enjoy alliterative invective but enough already.

By stipulating despair, I deflect it. I learned this mind-trick on my supposed deathbed. Fifteen years ago, I knew I was dying of cancer. Surgery and chemotherapy might prolong my stay, but not for long. I viewed every embrace as my last. Doctors rated my chances fair, but I knew better. (Likely they were sparing me the straight skinny.)

My morbid outlook cheered me up. Every day of sunlight was salvaged from the grave’s clammy dark. I kept thanking my stars. When doctors sounded the all-clear, I continued dying so I could feel better. I was dying just last night, but here I am – hallelujah!

So with our imperiled state. Its sickness is mortal. The Nameless One is not a pimple, but symptom of deep disease. The Nameless One’s daily predations, which Jane bewails, I treat as signs of a terminal diagnosis I’ve accepted. Nations die, just like people. Now is our time.

Fatalism does not relieve responsibility; we must do all we can to save ourselves. I rejoice at any evidence of a defiant spirit, however delusive. Protest marches, Cory Booker’s endless speech, some brave judges’ rulings suggest we are not dead yet. Economic collapse and outrageous brigandage I cheer as tocsins to waken us from our slumbrous overconfidence. What “can’t happen here” is happening fast, so we’d better organize and arm. We are all needed in civilization’s defense, even crusty old Carll in his role as counselor, consoler, encourager. Sure, we’re doomed, but who has time to mope!