Solitude

It's been a while since I've had these episodic attacks of insomnia and depression. Last night was awful. I lay awake in bed for what seemed like hours. Though looking at my phone at the time it must've been around three hours before I finally dozed off.

During college, being surrounded by writers, activists and musicians, we had a term for this. It was the "i wanna curl up and die" syndrome. The 1990's were an in-between time that made for a confused generation of people trying to sort their feelings out. You had the vestiges of the New Wave melodramatic culture trying to resurface. The angst of the revived punk movement was rising from the ashes. The technology of the internet was just starting to influence how people used computers. I and my group of writers were torn between our DOS-based Wordstar and new-car-smell appeal of Windows 3.1. There were left-wing rallies everywhere. I was wearing anything from torn jeans, concert t-shirts, leather sandals, Vans skate shoes, Mao caps, eye glasses (nope, I had perfect vision). I wore my hair long. I was a jumble of contradictions.

Those times, as confusing as they were, were conducive to writing. Writers with extreme emotions are able to draw inspiration from them. So bouts of depression were almost always half-wanted. These days, my bouts of depression are unwanted. They come and bother me from time to time. Usually the images in my head range from saddening scenes of me in various stages of emotional and physical distress to morbid thoughts of an unspeakable degree. The vivid detail in my imagination had always been a blessing or a curse.

So last night was difficult. I was struggling. I couldn't sleep. I almost wept. I was pathetic. But it was a cycle I had to go through, I had to ride it out. And then I dozed off. I woke up feeling tired, a few hours of sleep not helping one bit. I found my little girl had strewn the floor with 4 different kinds of flash cards. Toys were all over the floor too. She was almost at a tantrum and when she saw I was awake kept asking me for her morning bath. It was time for her morning bath and she was adamant about keeping her schedule. As I picked up the flash cards and started sorting them to put them back in their designated cartons, I felt a little bit better. The domestic routine ground on you, but it was also comforting to feel needed. Belonging is one thing, but to feel needed is foremost in what every depressed person out there may be craving. To feel useless is be without purpose. And without purpose, what are we to world?