Belay That?

I've given it some more thought, and I'm going to try to continue to keep this blog live after all. It doesn't cost anything, after all, and if no one reads it... oh well.

This has been a strange spring. It's been chilly and wet far more often than not; today I wore a jacket to work (it's almost July!), and I suspect that many of us are considering a change of career, perhaps something in the slug-farming field.

I am bored out of my skull at work, restless with the lack of challenge in my days, and less than happy with the changes that came with the acquisition. Outside of work, I seem to be exhausted all of the time, even when the kids sleep, and frequently grouchy. My usual optimism is nowhere to be found; I consider projects as a means of reviving my spirits, but stop short of undertaking them, because really what's the point? The world has no need of anything I am likely to produce. I am ambivalent about the entire Internet and seem to have lost faith in the whole idea of the world-wide conversation. Wary of engaging, alarmed by conflicts, and finding the entire business more a source of stress than of interest and pleasure, I dropped Twitter, dropped blogging, scaled back my Facebook activity. I switched my playlists to all-soothing, all the time. Work on the current novel has been reduced to occasionally opening the file and staring at the opening scene I was in the middle of rewriting.

I don't really like myself when I get like this. Even in a funk, I feel something of the problem-solving itch, which I suppose is all to the good. I'm trying to drink more water, taking some extra vitamin D, and if the weather hasn't improved by the time of my next paycheck, I'll buy a sunlamp. If that doesn't help, a trip to the doctor may be in order. Previous experience suggests that the thing to do when you're depressed is to the things that you enjoy when you're not depressed, and I have not been doing much of that.