Limbo

This was one of those times when I had to struggle to fall in love.  Thanksgiving and Girlsgiving are over.  It's not December yet, though the weather is frozen.  And today is the anniversary of my father's death 42 years ago.  Not much to love there, right?

And then the word limbo popped into my head.  I wish I was talking about the dance, but you know I'm not.  I guess I just feel like I am in limbo today, caught between two things, and I don't even know what they are.  It's not as simple as saying that I'm caught between Thanksgiving and Christmas; there are no holidays between which I ever feel "caught."  (I prefer to tiptoe around the edges of the holidays.)

Edges.  A religious definition of limbo is the edge of hell.  Some of you may know that limbo is defined as the place where unbaptized souls dwell until Jesus Christ can absolve them from original sin and send them on to heaven.  Perhaps you believe that, despite the fact that the term limbo does not appear in the Bible.  As a child, I felt so sad for the children that were waiting in limbo; it was fairly obvious that they'd done nothing to deserve such a fate.  I cared for them as much as I cared for the pagan babies, those poor and sorry foreign children who needed our American dimes to pay for their baptisms.  I dutifully contributed.

But it would probably be wise for me to avoid the religious meaning of limbo.  Here's another definition:  any in-between place, state, or condition of neglect or oblivion which results in an unresolved status, delay, or deadlock.  And yes, that is how I am feeling today.

But can I be in love with that feeling?  Let's see.

Neglect is clearly a negative word.  Today, I've neglected to do anything positive, unless you count cryptograms and Sudoku puzzles.  But oblivion?  Now there's a word that could be perceived as not entirely negative, as in she was oblivious to the idea that anything was wrong.  Did this oblivion lead me to an unresolved status?  Absolutely.  I posted no status whatsoever on social media today.  Delay?  Yes.  I have delayed dealing with all the correspondence which has arrived in the mail of late, advising me that there are things I must do pending my enrollment into Medicare in two months. 

Deadlock?  A deadlock is a situation in which two or more competing actions are each waiting for the other to finish, and thus neither ever does.  I am waiting to fall in love, but love is waiting to catch me off guard.  Deadlock.

But here's the deal.  Limbo can be a relaxing place, a time-out in which no decisions or actions need to occur.  Time to chill.  Time to channel Scarlet O'Hara:  After all, tomorrow is another day!