The Need To Be Useful, To Be Needed

Does it make any sense to distinguish the needs of men from the needs of women?

I suspect, instead, that different types of personality have different needs, and that these types are distributed between men and women alike.

As I keep this in mind, I can only express my need to be useful, to be necessary. Perhaps not every man feels the need; perhaps many women do. I have no idea.

I do know this: decades have taught me that efforts to be useful are, in isolation, useless. What is the use of a man's love to a woman with no need for love? What is the use of a man's loyalty, constancy, and memory to a woman who wants only to walk away and to never look back?

What is the point of writing without readers? One might as well toss bottles into the sea.

These are questions posed to the wind at night, but the wind moves on, the stars fade. Questions useless, unnecessary, because I already have my answers.

We love because we must. We remain loyal because we must. We treasure memories because we must. We toss bottles into the sea because isolation is the curse of a lifetime, and because we must live as if our curses were a lie.

The Purpose Of Genocide Nightmares

In a time of genocide, our terrible nightmares of murdered children are just the brain's way of compelling us to face the world as it is right now:

"Wake up. For the sake of humanity, wake up. Stop acting as if life were still normal. Wake up!"

ChatPTSD Tells Us All About M. R. James

Hey there, ChatPTSD! What can you tell us about the great British icon of supernatural stories, M. R. James?

"M. R. James is a notable writer of mysteries, whose most famous book, GREYBEARD, was filmed as THE CHILDREN OF BRIAN ALDISS.

"James also collaborated with Truman Capote to write THE INNOCENTS, which was filmed by Luchino Visconti as L'INNOCENTE. This film starred creepy child actor Martin Balsam, who would later go on to fame in VILLAGE OF THE DAMNED. His co-star in L'INNOCENTE, Deborah Kerr, was married to British bomber pilot Burt Lancaster, who would also appear in a famous Visconti epic, BORN FREE, in which Elsa Lanchester played a leopardess.

"M. R. James would later become Provost of Eaton's, a chain of Canadian department stores that specialized in antiquarian relics. No longer a mistress of mysteries, she became a ghost writer. Her most famous book, THE CASTER OF THE RUNES, was published under a pseudonym, J. G. Salinger, and went on to inspire the David Cronenberg film, RAISE HIGH THE DROWNED WORLD, CRASHERS.

"James then became a dentist on Her Majesty's buccal service, with a driver's licence to kill after dark in the parking fields -- truly, a warning to the carious."

AI? Aieeeee!

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