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Here, almost all media are subtracted from daily life. I notice the enormous difference immediately. The habit I have, of turning on the radio news as I drive to work, comes to mind as a destroyer of the natural rhythm of the day. Subtle, because flicking on the radio seems almost an automatic gesture, a neutral gesture. But in the half hour from my flat to the parking lot at school, drug lords are shot, children are abused by those who are supposed to protect them, car bombs go off, houses are carried off by floods, and my waking psyche has absorbed a load of the world's hurt. The bombardment of frightening, disturbing images assaults any well-being that might have accrued from a lovely night's sleep. TV probably would be worse; I rarely watch TV news except for reports of earthquakes and dire events. At school, I get out of the car already tense and not knowing why. The constant overload of recurrent horror on the news and in the papers we assume is normal until we live without it. Has any study focused on the correlation of anxiety and level of exposure to news? I read the paper here two or three times a week, enough to more than keep up with crucial events. “I'll start the day without that negative drone,” I tell Ed. “On my own terms.
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