the point is lost

Writing feels pointless now. Beyond pointless, perhaps. It feels dangerous and not in a good, subversive way but in a "anything I give to the internet will come back to hurt me in ways I can't yet fathom" way. I used to spend a lot of my time thinking about how I would put things into text, how I could structure funny observations in ways that I could share with my family, how I could demonstrate something like skill and craft. But now that all feels nearly impossible. Is anything funny? Are observations meaningful? Are there any human readers left? Is everything really reducible to a summary?

I'd like to blame this feeling of futility on the political climate or technology or capitalism, but I think the sadder truth is that I'm just becoming disenchanted with things. I didn't expect this to be a side-effect of my late(r) 40s, but here we are. And I can feel it bleeding out into the places that I thought would always be safe.

I used to think about my friends like a warm collection of beloved souls, people I would do anything for and make endless space for, people I always wanted to see and hear from, but lately, I just think of them as autonomous stars, circling their own worries and occasionally shining a little dim light my way. Art has gone the same way; the films and novels that made me feel alive and mad and awed are now mostly just ways to pass the time. Family gatherings, vacations, marriage, baking: I'm not depressed, honestly, I'm just sort of subdued. "Mid" is maybe how the kids would describe it, but I'm not sure I even care to find out.

Maybe this all comes back to writing feeling pointless. It's not like I'm some great writer, but the practice or craft or skill involved gave me something to hold onto and now it's just dissolved in my hands like so many replicable adjective-noun pairings.