Sometimes I crave something new. The new may be a new scene, dish, idea, routine, tune, whatever. I’m impatient, restive. I’m not unhappy where I am, not dissatisfied – who luckier than I? – not ungrateful, it’s just that, I don’t know, the familiar feels squeezed of its juice, been there, done that. Generally, I shake off this dismay by getting busy – or shoo it away as discreditable. The nerve of me, to ask for more!

I’m guessing such restlessness is common – though seldom mentioned. Discussing dissatisfaction magnifies it into a symptom. We assume what folks admit to “isn’t the half of it,” but “the tip of the iceberg.” I shudder off solicitude, as a horse does horseflies: no pity please, I’m fine, tip-top, couldn’t be better! This restlessness is… nothing, nonsensical, an aberration, like the common cold. It means nothing!

So we insist – but in our silence we know better. No signal dispatched by our psyche to our consciousness is insignificant. Our mind has something on its mind – a disquiet straining for attention. No, we are not in revolt – or even chafing in our traces – it’s just – as the old song sighs – “Is that all there is?”

Younger, harnessed and galloping, I paid such moods no heed, scraped and rinsed them as casually as whiskers. Older and idler, I permit them to explain themselves. I wait – like a priest in a confessional – while feelings gather into words: “What’s on your mind, mind?”

Humans, best we know, are the only creature subject to doubt. Where we are, however bountiful, is never where we might be. The Garden of Eden catered to every need – who could be happier! – yet Eve couldn’t help wondering what lay beyond those walls. The serpent beguiles us. The more vivid our imagination, the more gnawing our dissatisfaction. I want to whack myself for grousing – but what good would it do?

Happiness for me is heedlessness: I’m thinking, yes, but about something else. My mind may be lost in notions, music, conversation, games, the exhilaration of exertion. I’m happy now, wrestling this topic into six hundred amiable words. It’s silence that torments. Into the silence slithers the serpent hissing maybes.

Newness is anodyne. It obliges us to assess, determine our location, recalibrate relations. In a new place I’m not the same, so then who? Eve and Adam were likely wretched booted from Eden, but they were not bored.

I will never be dependably happy – until I’m dead – which I hope to postpone. I will always be crucified by regret – for songs unheard, friends unmet, words unsaid. God save me from contentment! – a gated community where nothing’s missing and all’s amiss. Eden is hell.

Dissatisfaction – the curse of consciousness – is the human condition. We may dread it – who likes feeling unfulfilled? – and cherish it; flee it – into newness, busyness, fixation, inebriants – for relief, intending to return. I send my mind out to play each morning, as a parent shoos their hyperactive child, hoping it will get good and tired and, home at dusk, slump to sleep.

Henry, my canine sidekick, doesn’t get this. It’s the least tractable difference between us. Henry’s OK where he is. Some situations may be preferable – stuck in his crate waiting is a bore, for example – but why fuss, what is is, we can’t be elsewhere than we are. Bodily discomfort may disquiet him, but never consciousness. While he sympathizes with my restlessness, he shakes his little head, incredulous as Puck: “Oh what fools these mortals be.”

I commenced this meditation to settle myself. The topic felt new. We’ve managed no conclusion, but the time has flown.