Tuesday, January 02, 2007

The December-to-February Pit of Despair

I previously mentioned that I'm generally depressed in December-February (inclusive). Well, I am.

It starts with the holiday season. The holiday season means almost nothing to me other than halcyon memories of brilliant holidays past. Growing up, it meant snow and pretty lights on the houses and 8 days when I would anxiously wait for dad to come home so I could spend the ensuing 30-60 min. nearly-bouncing off the walls while I waited for him to relax a bit before we lit the candles and I opened 1-or-more presents. In short, I remember the holiday season as once being fun. Even during college, the holidays meant a break from the hectic life of assignments, homework and tests. A time to pause and reflect in a pleasant, patient atmosphere.

These days? Not so much. It's my mom and I. That's it. Presents are not requested or necessarily expected (and when they are forthcoming, they're generally of the lawyer-joke-book or shirt-and-tie variety). I stink at present-finding and giving, such skills having equivalent rank as my culinary skills (that is to say, random acts of actual decency). The holiday season has ceased to be a time of, well, holiday for me. Toss in to this gritty mix my lack of a S.O. and the coup de grace is readily apparent.

I don't know if this is to say that I wish we spent some of the holiday season with relatives. That tends to be a harrowing experience and is often well-removed from any relaxing activity you or I can think of. That also has no throwback to my memories of days long past. I suppose some of it is that my dad isn't around and I tend to miss him more this time of year, probably due to the aforementioned memories.

Moving on, New Year's Eve has never been very good for me. No fun parties, no fun really. January holds little to otherwise interest me. It snows, I clean off the car, we take the dogs out, we de-ice the dogs, rinse & repeat. Hooray for the Northeastern winter.

February, however, has the real kick in the teeth. Just when you thought it was about as bad as it could get – cold, dark and oppressing – here comes Valentine's Day to reinforce the fact that, according to modern society (of which I have clearly bought into), you're clearly an unwanted dreg of society if you don't have someone (i.e., a S.O.) to share your life with. Pretty much everything reinforces that leading up to V-day – the media, the consumerism, the chocolate. If you're on your own for Valentine's Day, you're giving pond scum a run for its money (and the pond scum is winning). Add in the fact that the anniversary of my dad's death occurs in later February and you can see I have no love for that month.

Now those who know me can attest to the fact that I'm generally not one to stress out or get upset easily or any such. I'm usually very calm and easy-going.

But come this time of year and I've usually had enough.

And so I dub thee my December-to-February Pit of Despair. From the current outlook, this year appears to be better than last year's considering I have no intention to spend weeks on end with painful walking nor a particularly unpleasant week in the hospital, as with last year. No, in that respect it's an improvement. Even so, it doesn't look like anything significant is going to occur to change my view. New Year's Eve was the usual nothingness with me ringing in 2007 at home with mom and the two dogs. Valentine's Day is looking as bleak as ever. No, the usual pale white cityscape remains unbroken by a hint of excitement.

So it goes.

ADDENDUM: Man this post is dark. As in not just dark but dark. I need to go play with a puppy or something, and not in the playing-hockey-with-the-puppy-as-the-puck kind of way, either. (Afterthought)