Pass the eggnog

The semester is almost over and I have never been more relieved to be finished.

The past few months have been a torrential downpour of research papers & essays & even more research papers. I can honestly say that when I am done I will have earned every single point in my statistics class.

I'm also glad to be able to hibernate during the holiday season. Stupid retail job aside, it will be a good time to just retreat. I will have deserved some time to be a bum during the winter.

It also worries me a bit, since my mood just starts to worsen as it gets colder. Seasonal Affective Disorder seems to be lurking its ugly head, waiting for me to think I'm doing fine. I'll enjoy free time so much that I slowly start to isolate myself from the outside world. I'll make excuses to not go anywhere because it will be too cold out & stay in my home for weeks on end. At first I'll really enjoy catching up on my reading. Then I'll clean the house, organize everything, and maybe do something new with my hair. I'll teach myself new things on photoshop & watch movies all day.

Then I'll slowly start to get moody & not want to be around anyone. I'll no longer enjoy any quiet time to myself because I'll be bored, but I will be too fearful to leave the house because by then I would have talked myself into distrust & anxiety from the thought of having to interact with people.

I'll become just sluggish and bummed out because of my mental state & because I would have gone several weeks without sunlight on my face. Soon after that, I will be absolutely nuts.

This seems to happen every year when it starts to get cold, and I don't get back to living my life until it warms up & people force me to get outside & do things. The holidays are a blessing in the form of rest & a curse in the form of me sinking into a deep depression.

I remember 2 holidays ago I was at one of my lowest points when I was completely alone & just felt sick in every sense of the word. I spent Christmas Eve barhopping, surrounding myself with other strangers who felt completely alone. No one in that bar came in with someone else. People were all staring into their drinks & I felt so disgustingly similar. I hated how I fit in with this group of sad people. Drinking to drown out everything on a day when everyone else is at home with friends & family. Feeling completely alone because I had worked so hard to isolate myself. I felt out of place at family holiday parties & I didn't exactly fit into the rock bottom bar fly scene. I remember just wanting to literally go jump off the bridge over 75/85 in midtown. So I got in my car, started the engine, opened the door & puked on the sidewalk, & took a 5 minute nap because I was just too scared to end things, as miserable as I was.

I drove home & thought about the bridge that night, promising myself that I would never end up like the people in that bar. I would either have that friends/family holiday kind of life or work my ass off at my career. I would not stoop to that point again, because that would be the end point. If that were to be my only option I would not be driving home, but letting myself fall off a bridge. I decided that I'll either have a family or a career (maybe both, if I'm ever that lucky), but I wont end up with nothing to my name.

My holidays are usually miserable. I dont really recall any of them, since pointless memories shouldn't be held onto. It makes perfect sense to me why so many people kill themselves during that time of year. You just feel like there is nothing better to wake up to the next day and there is no other hope for you to live a meaningful life. Worse of all, you have nobody to express that to because you are alone, with no one to remember your name once you're gone.

I really hope this holiday won't be like the rest. I'm going to try to force myself to do something with my time instead of hoping I'd have the will to live to start spring semester.

Maybe I'll try a new approach this year. Work on my career stuff, volunteer, or go out shooting cool pictures. I haven't decided. I just dont want to get too comfortable with having alone time so I won't want to isolate myself.