Come quickly. I am drinking the stars.
-Dom Perignon
I've been thinking a lot lately about my bout with severe depression last summer, about what I was thinking then and how it felt and how it is that I'm still alive. I'd say there are two main reasons I'm still alive, one of which is that I'm a total chicken when it comes to pain and the other is that I have friends who love me, who I have no doubt were placed in my life for such a time.
I read dooce's post today about her depression, and it left me feeling grateful. Grateful to the ones who knew exactly what was going on (there was one, just one, who had been there before and come out on the other side, to whom I felt I could say anything, who by her very life assured me that someday it would be all right) and to those who didn't, but knew I was very sad, and offered to help. Every day, indeed, feels like a present, a gift, a plateful of the most delicious kind of grace.
I never anticipated feeling what I felt, reacting to a catalyst the way I did, wanting to actually die in order to escape the state I found myself in. But I felt it, and I know now what it feels like, and for the record, it's sucky and it's awful, and in some ways it's selfish, but it's also perfectly understandable and totally okay to find yourself there. I say that last part because I felt such a sense of defeat about feeling that way, as if I could have somehow controlled my feelings better than I did, when the truth is that I couldn't have, and I needed a little help. Maybe I needed a lot of help. Maybe I still do, but in different ways. Maybe we all do, and part of our job here on earth is to just hang out with each other when things get rough. And then, when they get better, and they stay better, to quietly celebrate each and every good day.
Let's celebrate, you and me, today.
Cheers.
2006-01-10 - 6:41 p.m.
