Ill winds of April

"The wind is in from Africa
Last night I couldn't sleep."

That line of Joni Mitchell's was what first got me thinking about ill winds, like those known to blow into Europe off of Africa, among others. Some say it's the ions. There's also the relatively recent awareness of weather- or seasonal-affective disorder.

I think there's maybe more than just those things, although I couldn't say what. Ions might be enough. Whatever. That storm that blew through earlier this month, with tornadoes killing dozens? I watched the weather radar the very hour the line of storms first formed, just west of us, and it was scary how fast it grew to monstrous force and extent. Tornadoes struck within a few miles North and South of us. I can report that before, during, and for a while after that, emotions raged around our house. Afterward, in recovery, we realized we felt like we'd been drugged, poisoned. Along with the physical weather damage there's been waves of what I've come to call "April madness," a seeming spike in random beat-downs, suicides, family murders, etc. Just my impression, over a couple of years; I've not compiled statistics.

If weather — especially dramatic changes — seriously affect moods, for whatever reasons, well, April is major weather change month. Columbine and Waco and OKC were all on 4/20, Hitler's Birthday. (Thank goodness this year's 4/20 bomb in Colorado, 2 miles from Columbine, did not go off!) Of course, McVeigh said the OKC date was intentionally chosen because of the anniversary of Waco, so not every April insanity should be attributed directly to the ill winds, but I'm suggesting that these are realities to be careful about: Be aware you and yours may be subject to externally-induced moods. What can we do? Not much about the weather itself. (Heh — "Everybody talks about the weather, but…") First, try to remember your (or someone else's) foul mood could be an uncontrollable reaction related to weather. The mood alteration begins well before the actual storm breaks, just as the barometer changes. Watch the barometer, get plenty of rest, take your B vitamins, watch Marx Bros movies, and wait out the storms.

Our Naturopath has a homeopathic remedy combination for "Anxiety" which I believe helped us a lot. (If you don't "believe" in homeopathy, tune out now, I'm done.) We've always been "classical" homeopathic users, which system doesn't use these combination remedies, so I don't know if one or several or all of these remedies were effective, but if only the placebo effect, thank Heaven for it! Not gonna post the doc or the remedies involved, this is not the place, but if you find yourself anxious, and can find a genuine homeopath advisor, maybe it can be of benefit to you. (Noting that Sturgeon's Law applies redoubled: 99% of "homeopaths" are worse than useless new-agey many-discipline kooks; there was a really great homeopathic MD we used to have in Chicago, so they do exist).