Have you ever been depressed and you can't figure out just why? While I've never really been the overly happy and over-animated type, this mood--this damned mood--is hanging ominously over my head like a shadow. What's worse is that I can't figure out exactly why. It's a feeling of starkness; as if I'm utterly alone, almost an ant-in-a-warehouse sort of feeling. I know there are other people close by--within earshot, even--but tonight I can't seem to shake this feeling that there's just nobody there. To quote a Dream Theater song: "How can I feel abandoned, even when the world surrounds me?" There's an emptiness in my gut that just won't go away; a sense of foreboding consequence. If I had some legitimate problem to deal with, I would be able to relax a little and this feeling wouldn't be so bad. Instead, I'm sitting here over my computer, chain-smoking and drinking too much soda, trying for the life of me to figure out exactly why I feel like this.
As soon as I started noticing this gnawing sense of despondency, I tried to counter it with some music, which usually helps to some degree or another. This time, no matter what it is I try to drown this sorrow with is having very little beneficial help. My favorite bands and songs aren't having their usual mood-improving effects. I've concluded that no matter what it is I decide to listen to, nothing will overcome this funk. As I type out this forlorn testimony, I'm listening to a song which accurately matches my mood: Opeth's To Bid You Farewell. Slow tempo, sad lyrics, and in some damn minor key that just makes you feel...alone. Doesn't matter; I've tried up-tempo songs with almost overly enthusiastic lyrics, but no effect whatsoever comes from them. If there is an effect from the faster songs, it's just to piss me off at their cheerfulness and, frankly, their downright smarminess. I suppose misery really does love company.
Back in the early days of medicine, the Greeks based one's personality and temperament on the balance of four "humours" within one's body. The four categories are sanguine, phlegmatic, choleric, and melancholy. I find myself very easily belonging to the category of melancholy, the qualities being despondent, irritable, and insomniac. The first and last are immediately recognized by the reader if he or she has read the content of these musings and has noticed the time of which I'm going to eventually post this. The irritability I try to keep in check for the most part, but sometimes it does rear its ugly head. I tend to think a lot; perhaps too much. I feel empathetic to a large degree, and it is easy for me to shoulder others burdens, sometimes forsaking my own. I'm not trying to boast selflessness and charity, but I very often feel obligated in some way to help others in my life. My willingness to help and the easiness with which I trust people have been detrimental to me time and time again, but still I try to make others lives better in whatever way that I can. I've learned a few lessons over the years, but I must remind myself to stay vigilant when dealing with other people now, for fear of getting exploited again. I don't suppose any of this is necessarily pertinent to the subject of this rant, but sometimes the words just type themselves.
I've got some errands to run in a few hours, and I am not looking forward to them at all. Even if I'm in a better mood by then, I am not relishing the thought of going out, crippling my ass around on crutches, exclaiming with every step how much it fucking HURTS. Everyone who knows me knows that I am prone to some epic arthritis flare-ups, this particular one lasting for about four months, with minor periods of respite in between. Multiple joints at once flare up, making it hurt just to shift position while I'm sleeping. Sometimes even the weight of a sheet on my feet feel like they're being crushed into fine powder, and it occasionally feels like I'm being stretched apart on the rack, just like they did in the days of the Inquisition. More often than not, I'd just as soon have bionic limbs so that I know they won't hurt then.
I guess I'll wrap this up for now; it hasn't done much for my mood really, but either it'll improve or it won't. Reckon I shall continue burning the proverbial midnight oil, smoking cigarettes and drinking Pepsi. Ten o'clock isn't far off, and I'm really dreading it by the minute. A massive dose of opiates would do just fine right now.
Eddie
06-08-11
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