When the darkness of depression descended on the great novelist William Styron, he found inspiration and succor in music, specifically Johannes Brahms’ Alto Rhapsody.
There’s a song that has the same effect on me when it feels like my spirit is heavy and the skies are perpetually gray: It’s “Everybody Hurts” by R.E.M.
When your day is long
And the night, the night is yours alone
When you’re sure you’ve had enough
Of this life, well hang on
Don’t let yourself go
‘Cause everybody cries
Everybody hurts sometimes …
It is a song that makes me feel less alone in my torment, less guilty about feeling the way I feel when the clouds gather and my brain is bathed in an unspeakable sadness.
So when I was half-watching TV recently, I perked up when I heard the song being played to open a commercial. An ad from Colts owner Jim Irsay and his daughter…
