A Maddening Itch

Last updated on: May 5, 2015 at 7:17 pm by John Mark N. Reynolds

A Maddening Itch 2015-05-05T19:17:42-04:00 John Mark N. Reynolds

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Yesterday Houston was so like Los Angeles that I sat without shoes with Dad on his back porch and learned that “like” is not “same as.” The mosquitoes came and they feasted . . . twenty or more on each foot and somehow I noticed nothing until bedtime. And then the itching began, impossible to ignore, initially pleasurable to satisfy, but fundamentally insatiable. Cream helped some, but I itch. I itch now.

We named our Sugar Land Baseball Team the Skeeters for a reason.

And yet I should not keep scratching. My skin can stand no more scraping or I will be scratching away the skin each scratch. Some wise guys even claim that the more I scratch the itch, especially if I irritate my skin, the longer the itch will last. So I must endure not doing what I wish to do for what I should do.

And I wish to scratch now.

At times today, during meetings or when talking to friends, the itch has seized control of my mind. “Scratch!” my feet screamed, “Get up and walk! Do something!” I could not speak and so achieved the appearance of clarity when what I was thinking was about the burning, tormenting desire to scratch, but scratch I did not. Mostly.

There is not much of a lesson here, but there is something to learn. I can be overwhelmed by a desire to do a thing and yet my will, using reason, can keep my body still. “Scratch!” my body screams. “No.” my minds says calmly and so I do not scratch, mostly. Perhaps, I began to realize there is virtue here. I need not be a slave to my feelings, even feelings that I cannot ignore.

The part of me saying no to the itch just now is what Plato called the mind. My passions and my body cry itch, but my mind can exercise control. Small as it is, I have learned that such training is useful. When I feel a desire, and it is not appropriate to act on that desire, do I practice restraint. . . even in small ways? If I learn to deny myself in the small itches, surely it will be (a bit?) easier to restrain myself from acting on the larger desires.

I want more steak, but I shan’t have it. Enough. Sufficient. This is easier than the itch in one way, but so quiet and subtle (unlike these bites) that I might miss the need for restraint. Surely though, a man who can stop his continuous scratching can keep from gluttony.

Here is a discovery: my desire to scratch never ends, but it does wax and wane. Sometimes it is intense, but if I say “no” and focus on other things, I can almost forget the craving to scratch until I move and the wreckage left by the mosquitoes is roused into itchy fury. At some points the itchiness is so bad that I think that if it continues like this, I will just give up and scratch super hard . . . but when (and if) I do give in, the relief is not even short-lived. One scratch leads to four.

So I have found it with all outsized desires that must be resisted. Just when I can’t stand it, I can. Just when I think it is over, there is more. Desires are not bad in themselves, most itches are for scratching, but I must be in control. My mind, my renewed in Christ mind, must be in control. My mind says “scratch” and then “do not scratch” and my mind can prevail.

This is very good news. Those who endure mosquito bites to the end will be salved.

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