One of my favorite moods is something I’ve called “vehemence”.

I just looked up the etymology, and now I like it even more. Vehemence means “forcefulness, violence, rashness”. For me, it means getting carried away by my own intuitive force.

From the Online Etymology Dictionary:

vehemence (n.)

c. 1400, from Old French vehemence, veemence “forcefulness, violence, rashness” or directly from Latin vehementia “eagerness, strength,” from stem of vehere “to carry” (from PIE root *wegh- “to go, move, transport in a vehicle”).

Entries linking to vehemence: wegh- Proto-Indo-European root meaning “to go, move, transport in a vehicle.”

The root wegh-, “to convey, especially by wheeled vehicle,” is found in virtually every branch of Indo-European, including now Anatolian. The root, as well as other widely represented roots such as aks– and nobh-, attests to the presence of the wheel — and vehicles using it — at the time Proto-Indo-European was spoken.

Merriam-Webster adds an alternative account:

NOTE: Alternatively explained as a prefix v?– “faulty, excessive or deficient” and ment-, mens “mind,” in which case –ehe– is an unetymological spelling of the long vowel. Though this would account for vehemens in place of *vehimens (with normal vowel weakening), the word never has the sense “mentally deranged” (the meanings of the presumed parallel formations vecors and vesanus).

I creatively (mis)interpret this as a sort of faith in my pre-knowing gut to produce just the right fury-inspired thoughts and words and actions, without any need for conscious reflection.

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But the most important thing about vehemence is that this is a happy anger at exactly those things that in weaker moments reduce me to bitter impotence.

From vehemence, I feel comic contempt for people who try so hard to believe unbelievable beliefs, adopt the ugly linguistic habits and perform the tortured etiquette of mass-minded tribalists.

I’m simpy not participating — not with it — but also not against it, because the antis are just a different variety of dangerously dumb.

It’s all incredibly dumb, and the tragic violence to come will just make it dumber, though the violence itself will probably throw some sublime sparks here and there. Mostly it will be a sea of bloody, muddy stupidity.

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At least today, so far, I’m vehemently outside the nonsense.

I want to live here.