I know what I want to say or how I want to describe something but the right word or words fail me. It's a feeling that I can't quit grasp in words yet can feel perfectly. So I was hoping someone here may be able to suggest some words or ideas that may unmask this feeling.. It's something on the edge of perfect happiness with extreme lows of depression felt in sync. It's boarder line madding feeling to have but could also make for a good char trait... anyway just thought I would throw it out here and see what bounces back.. thanks
You are trying to describe two contrasting emotions? I have known people on happy pills and they tend to describe it as a plastic feeling or a veneer of happiness over a void of melancholia. In fact they don't quite describe it like that, I just put their description into my own words.
Manic, bipolar, saturnine, sardonic, manic-depressive, a ball of perfect hate wrapped in smiles and teeth that both greeted me as a friend and threatened to sink into my throat at a moment's notice, that glint of joyous maniacal rage in his eyes that told me things were about to get weird, his saturnine grin spoke of ruin and rapture in equal measure, a Cheshire smile tinged with the gnawing acid of hopelessness, his smile might as well been a scar for it was every bit as permanent as it was false...any of these helping you out?
Not an emotion, but bittersweet? I also think hysteria might be able to do the job if given a good description.
Why one word? why not a comparison or a phrase your character invents - Here's one of my faves from Holly Golightly ( movie version )- Holly Golightly: You know those days when you get the mean reds? Paul Varjak: The mean reds, you mean like the blues? Holly: No. The blues are because you're getting fat and maybe it's been raining too long, you're just sad that's all. The mean reds are horrible. Suddenly you're afraid and you don't know what you're afraid of. Do you ever get that feeling? Paul : Sure. Holly: Well, when I get it the only thing that does any good is to jump in a cab and go to Tiffany's. Calms me down right away. The quietness and the proud look of it; nothing very bad could happen to you there. If I could find a real-life place that'd make me feel like Tiffany's, then - then I'd buy some furniture and give the cat a name!
The "mean reds" so clearly describes tetchiness in my mind, I find it almost impossible to ascribe fear.
I know that feeling, it's almost like a panic attack. Wherever you are, you just freeze and think "I shouldn't be here, I don't want to be here but I don't actually know where I do want to be ..."
