Sometimes it feels crazy because it is.

I took in a writers’ seminar last weekend. Not writer as in, “There’s one great book in everyone and I’m about to write mine.” But as in, “We’ve invited a bunch of great writers to come and speak.” It was a wonderfully stimulating day.

The featured speaker was Anne Lamott. If you haven’t read her “Bird by Bird,” it’s a classic blend of how to write and what you learn about yourself in the process. You don’t have to be a writer to read it. Put it on your list.

If you’ve read any of her stuff, Anne Lamott is very open about how crazy she is — OCD, addiction and general weirdness. (Yes, she’d say that.) She’s bright, talented, funny and an unreconstructed hippie.

Hearing her reminded me why I value my wife so much — not the only reason, but one of the reasons. My wife is wired concrete and practical while I’m wired conceptual and, if you’ve read earlier blog entries, usually anxious.

While I love a lot of the stuff Anne Lamott writes — she’s got a remarkably robust grasp of reality — if I’d married someone like her, they’d have both of us locked up by now.

It reminded me that a lot of what we think and feel is shaped by the emotive atmosphere and how we interact with it.

One of my children ran away from school one day in the third or fourth grade. (I never get the details right.) We were relieved when he was found hiding in field just a block from the school, yet alarmed by the entire episode. It was only later, when we heard that his teacher was edging up on a major manic-depressive episode (difficult and sad), that we realized the runaway was actually an escape of sorts.

A lot of life’s craziness is not so crazy when you can get some perspective.

The point? Or points?

1. I’m very fortunate to have married a complementary personality. We sure didn’t know what we were doing at the time. Or maybe we did, intuitively. (A friend of ours from West Virginia likes to say, “Even a blind hog finds an acorn once in while.”)

2. Sometimes the emotive atmosphere virtually precludes success. Or it becomes such a big part of what's going on, success is difficult. Projects, relationships, businesses, events … things sometimes fail because, with the people in the room at the time, the odds of a productive outcome are greatly reduced. We've all been there.

3. Anne Lamott’s “Bird by Bird” — you must read it.