Every cloud...

Let's get this straight.  I am in a poor state.

 

Long time readers and fans of the Captain everywhere will know that as an unmedicated depressive, I often have the odd episode of... a less than satisfactory mood.  This has been happening for years and years, possibly longer than I care to remember.  I know VIth form was bad at times, and we all know that my second year was dreadful... I am coming clean about my overall experience slowly but surely for that year; I cannot use my account as the emotional battering ram that you might expect, usually because it backfires straightaway.  I doubt I'll write about it so directly for a while, it's still a bad time.  I still feel the echoes even now, but what can you expect from someone who eschews both councelling and medication?

 

I knew something was the matter yesterday morning, when I started to write about my new environment.  No, I haven't moved house thank God, more that I have purchased built and made a double bed in my room in The Scholary.  A Double Bed!  Turns out 4' 6" is a lot wider than you imagine.  I got it for £50, delivery included from a gentleman in Redruth.  Purchased Sunday previous, and awoken in for the first time yesterday, I don't think I've done too badly.  It is... strange.  Having lived with a single bed for some 22 years, the readjustment is staggering!  I know many of you may have had doubles for a long time now, but this is very new to me; comfort is an odd concept.  But, it is the bed that Peb built.  I earned it, I payed for it with my own money, and I deserve it. 

 

One day, I will believe that last thought.

 

However.  Just what is the matter with me?  Assessing my position logically leads us only to confusiuon: Accomodation, employment, amazing relationship.  The three things that I've been after for so long now.  Really, under all this, I'm the happiest I've ever been.  While I may not have a megabucks job, waiting tables isn't really all that bad, and after all, it's a living.  My house, is of course The Scholar's Palatial Apartments, in the shadow of the East End.  It will always need a hell of a lot of work doing, but it's home now, especially after my furniture shuffle in my room.  And the girl?  Well, I'm not going to say anything more than she's really the best thing ever.  She has the kindest heart I know, and the only woman I respect more than her is my mother (I am a good Jewish boy, after all).  I can rely on her to clip my ear when I get silly, if only I myself could drop things as easily as I should.  I'm still working on it.  Promise.  Of course, my best work is always ahead of me.

 

 

I've all but lost my appetite, and I don't understand.  Perhaps the solution lies somewhere in my disability?  As an autist, I rely on routines and knowing where my boundaries are.  I've completely lost all my usual routines, and even changed my environment.  This change is massive put together, far bigger than I'm used to.  I also don't really have a 'holiday mode' as such, never having really gone on the things.  Had I have swapped my room in term, with services every day (my default mode of being), I would have taken it easily.  Something as simple as no evensong has upset me, obviously.  My new financial regime that I have had to impose to curtail my monetary ruin is a complete turn around as well.  This isn't as easy as saying that I have over-estimated my own strength, like that time I started working at Truro School; this is a change with more necessity behind it.  I can no longer afford to bum about in the nether regions of my overdraft, and at least working my way out is better than simply being on the Dole. 

 

Working what is technically 6 days a week is hardly exciting though.  I'm going to have to seriously reconsider this job once Choir term starts again, as working seven days a week will be a serious drain.  But...maybe that's what has to happen in order to improve my finances.  I'm not looking forward to it one bit, especially as I'll be working indoors all the time as well. 

 

 

As I've written this, I've actually started to feel better.  Just a little bit maybe, but still.  I've been on the phone to both my mother and my lady, both of whom in their unique and effective ways have chided me and got me to keep this pitiful chin of mine up.  I've come so far even in this past month alone, let alone the past year.  To err is only human; to admit divine.  To fail now though would be the end.  To pick the fight up again is more a personal hallmark, but sometimes tradition is what you need.  I feel pretty ashamed for allowing my depression to get the better of me at any time, and especially right now.  I think getting it all down has helped: being able to review in such a manner is helping me to think that I am just being ridiculous, and with a some corrective effort I can pull this up with a minimum of discomfort. 

 

Not everything can be easy every day, and I can't be happy all the time.  I need to stop taking it out on myself when I'm not though; not every little thing can be my fault.

Tonight's plan involves some kind of food - I may treat myself to a takeout of some description to help pick me up.  Other than that, quality time with my Banjo in the garden calls out to me.  I put a good two hours into practicing my Bach suite yesterday, and my callouses are holding up just fine now. 

 

Hiatus

 

Now at the final review before publishing, I do feel much better.  I've eaten, I've made the bed, I've made peace.  I'll need some serious chutzpah back soon, if only there was some sort of fast track?  Aha, nothing's ever that easy though, is it?  I've got far better things to do than mope.  This may well be a burst of a good mood, but I must make sure that it is not brief.  As ashamed as I am of not being with it today, I have to move on.  There really is no point dwelling on it, I know, but it is difficult for me to drop things.  But I must, and I will.  

 

How else will I see that paisley lining?