But this is Chico, too

Eons ago (it was more than two weeks, in fact) when I did my last post, I wrote that one of the goals of my upcoming vacation would be to make my mind a perfect blog blank. It was getting to the point where every thought I had was insisting I audition it for a bit part in cyberspace. It starting to feel harried and harassed.

Things went fine the first week. My mind got the rest it needed. But by week two, blog ideas were starting to storm the gates of my consciousness. I tried to pass them off as column fodder. After all, I told myself, my ban was not intended to apply to “But this is Chico,” which appears without fail in the E-R every Monday, whether I’m on vacation or not.

I quickly realized that this was just a mind game. I’m almost ready to start a long series of columns based on readers’ memories of being in Bidwell Mansion. It will run for at least a couple of months. And when I’m done with that, I have enough column ideas to last me through the rest of the year. The supply of topics vastly outstrips the space that is available for “But this is Chico.”

So, no. These nascent ideas that have been begging me to pay attention can only find a home in cyberspace, with its unlimited carrying capacity.

In my efforts to make my mind a blog blank, I came to appreciate anew not only the tremendous ability of the brain to filter experience, but how much experience there is to filter. Think of all the physical sensations we routinely block. Having to focus on breathing, blinking and swallowing would overwhelm us. What if we weren’t able to ignore the contasnt presence of that wiggly eel of a tongue that is trapped in our mouth? What if we couldn’t tune out the white noise that makes a ringing sound in our ears even in the most quiet moments? What if the process of digestion required us to think about it?

Add to that all the thoughts, emotions and urges that make our way willy-nilly to our brain every second we are awake or asleep and I start to be amazed out how this filter manages to keep from breaking down.

Or maybe it does break down from time to time. Maybe that’s what madness is. Maybe what the Cheshire Cat told Alice is true:

“I don’t want to go among mad people," Alice remarked. "Oh, you can't help that," said the Cat: "We're all mad here. I'm mad. You're mad."

I guess I should take comfort in the fact that my blog brainstorming mechanism is in fine working condition. I’d prefer to have thoughts clogging my brain than to go mad.