Grist

I like grist mills.  I like watching the water turn the wheel, the wheel turn the big metal rod thingies, the cogs and sprockets and whatsits all interlocking and translating the motion of the water into the motion of the great stone wheels that grind, grind, grind, until what was once the dried, tough kernel of some grass-related plant turns into powder useful for all kinds of kitchen alchemy.

I like seeing old millstones used in architecture and gardening, repurposed after the grooves are almost worn smooth.  I sometimes imagine making a patio out of some of those magnificent old stones, filling in between them with smaller stones and sand or planting creeping thyme or some other low-growing herb.

I don't like feeling as if I'm one of those hard shelled grains being ground down on some cosmic millstones, the wheel of time turning, turning, turning as I am worn away to nothing.  I don't like feeling as if I have somehow been bound to one of those old, worn out wheels and dropped into the millpond, left to struggle in vain to reach the surface as I am dragged ever downward into the murky depths.

I feel heavy and worn and useless, and I feel as if I would cry if only I could, but I cannot.

Hello, depression.