This is a lyrical companion piece to “The Scapegoat Files,” a collection of fragments I published on November 20.
You got to drift in the breeze
Before you set your sails
— Paul Simon, “Learn How to Fall” (1973)
The Heir to the Storm
Every family assigns roles.
Some are loud. Some are invisible.
Some come with instructions; most do not.
In The Scapegoat Files, I wrote about the one who carries what the family cannot bear.
But there is always someone else nearby—
the child of the scapegoat,
the friend, the roommate, the listener,
the person who becomes an anchor by proximity rather than choice.
We all inherit something we didn’t consent to.
For some, it’s obvious: a title, a position, a public destiny.
Think of those born into succession—names and ranks assigned before breath, a future already structured. You hear them say, later, with a practiced lightness, that they didn’t choose this role, but feel duty-bound to it. Crown and country. Family and service.
Queen Elizabeth II seemed to mean it.
Not as performance, but as belief.
Her coronation vows were not administrative; they were sacramental.
She may not have chosen the role, but she adopted it as a faith.
Once inside it, she gave herself fully—body, discipline, silence.
Most of us receive no such ceremony.
No one tells us: This is what you will carry.
No one explains the boundaries, the cost, the duration.
You simply discover, one day, that your life has been quietly shaped by an inherited position—
supporter, stabilizer, witness, ballast.
Is it a curse or a blessing?
Usually both.
Usually undecidable.
What matters is learning how to live inside it without disappearing.
The Tide
Lately, a particular tide has been rising again—the tide of the scapegoat.
It brings with it everything the sea never sorts for you: algae, wreckage, old tangles of rope.
It refuses to recede.
It clings to shore as if retreat means annihilation.
Because retreat would require peace.
And peace would require surrender.
She grew up in a storm.
The storm is over now.
Objectively speaking, the waters are calm.
But calm can feel like betrayal when chaos was once the only proof of reality.
So she relives the storm—
not to suffer, but to stay oriented.
She needs a listener.
To relive it alone is unbearable.
The child of the scapegoat learns this early:
listening becomes a form of love.
Witness becomes a kind of duty.
Anchors
Intuition—that’s hers.
Literature—that’s mine.
Some people weather storms with another human.
Some with books.
Some with prayer, or discipline, or routine.
Whatever anchors you, anchors you.
The danger is not attachment.
The danger is mistaking the anchor for the sea.
I’ve read endlessly about the lives of people who suffered deeply and thought clearly.
Their paths vary, but the pattern repeats:
Preparation.
Storm.
Survival.
Assessment.
Cleanup.
And finally—silence.
Silence is the part no one warns you about.
The Silence
If you can bear it, silence is the best part.
It doesn’t feel that way at first.
It can feel hostile. Suspicious. Like a trap.
It’s too peaceful, you think.
This must be a trick.
It isn’t.
That silence—the one you haven’t befriended yet—
that’s the god you’ve been looking for.
Not external. Not demanding.
Not loud.
It’s eternity without spectacle.
It’s you, unassigned.
Anchor.
Friend.
Love.