kvetching up

Burton's Anatomy of Melancholy, 1628. Entry 1 I felt better with the sun out. It leavens my depression, not lifting it completely, but enough to relieve what is otherwise unrelenting. While the sun was rea balm, I crave the darkness when I am blue. I wrap it around me like a blanket each night, and curse the longer days. While i hate the gray and darkness of winter in general, being swallowed by darkness is nature's metaphor for what I crave.   William  styron, in Darkness visible, a memoir about his depression written well before anybody was listening to Prozac, describes the "gray drizzle of horror induced by depression takes on the quality of physical pain." For me it's an ache, a nagging beast reminding me I am still here. I think my flavor of depression is less acute and yet longer lasting than Stryon's, but that is only speculation. If his was a failed transmission, stopping him dead in his tracks, mine is more like haivng the low air light for the tires...

 Entry 1    1:15 p.m. Abby and I did some grocery shopping last night, and I decided to buy a small cake to celebrate her birthday. I broke down and started crying as soon as the cake was in the cart. I had a hard time pulling myself together. Abby put her arm around me, and comforted me. I probably cried for 2 minutes, tears streaming down my face, my suffering otherwise silent.  I hate this existence, and am grateful for my children. I keep expecting a tsunami of pain. Instead, it is more insipid, this loss, like a slow leak from a third floor bathroom that eventually destroys the foundation. Every once in a while, though, a burst or two sneaks out, a foreboding of what I expect is to come? I don't know. Some days I convince myself I am numb, or not experiencing the pain I expected. Truth be told, I have no fucking idea what to expect. Right now I just feel heavy and sad all over. I hate it, but its  true. I feel about as useful as a ballot mailed the day...

Entry 1 Woke up at 1.  Almost 3 now.  Can't sleep.  Looked at her CA 19-9 results.     37746.0

L einey turned 19 this morning at 634 a.m. She has the most positive disposition of anyone I know. She also makes Jenny and I look like we hold 1950s small town conservative values.  Leiney's beliefs are well informed and based on reading, schooling, podcasts, life experience and activism.  She is everything I would be if I could go back and do my life over again. She can be sanctimonious, can perseverate, and be very judgmental of her parents, but that goes with the territory of the adult teen years. She has it all figured out. For now. She is a light burning bright. The Birthday Party It was a low key affair.  Jane and Catherine came over, Jenny's sisters are in Sun Valley.  Abby was moody, said moodiness has escalated in tbe last few days, for reasons unclear.  Moreover, she is aloof with even me, which is new.  That was true even before last night's drive to Red Robin. She, at 15, can truck no advice or direction on her driving.  When I told her la...