"Go! Away! Go away!" I told them. I said they ought to go. "Do what it is that you are doing, that what that is you. Whatever," I continued. "Please, leave me be! I need the quiet and the calm that you do not offer," I said. I tell them these things because their presence drains me, and they stand, staring sometimes glaring. Their needs are many and of the greatest magnitude and they return little or nothing. There is work in the world; there is activity. The work does not come from nowhere. It is entropic, though these pests do not comprehend. I must strain myself in order to prop my good cheer for long enough to sate their need for recognition that knows no end, though rarely am I able to smile, because the expression demands authenticity. It must actually come from me. They make me weak; I need tea and sugar of some kind after I encounter them.
Strangely, it is you, my friend, who vitalizes me somehow - you who are a present absence. Thank you again for the calm.