Today I am 39. I feel like I should mark this for myself somehow. I used to care so much about seeing who I am reflected in words. It seems less and less wise as the years go by. I destroy relationships with my words. I hurt people when I share my thoughts. I hope and I dream for understanding when I pour my heart out.

It doesn’t work that well though.

I feel like this might be the most inward facing period of my life. When I was a child I had times when I was more isolated and more alone but it’s not the same thing. I am not out frantically trying to communicate. I am not trying desperately for understanding. I no longer have hope that I will find it and I am out of energy to try.

It’s kind of funny that I feel sad and withdrawn and depressed but about as far from suicide as I have ever been. I have made commitments and it doesn’t matter how I feel it matters how I act. I will show up for them.

I will smile and act pleased when all I want to do is curl up in a ball in a closet and cry. Because my problems are mine. Because it feels like the inability to feel happy is my fault and I should not inflict it on anyone else. It is no one else’s fault that I feel so empty. But I will do the dishes and sweep the floor and listen to the stories that other people tell and I will try as hard as I can to not think about how I feel.

Because it doesn’t matter.

It’s funny that being away from the large community of people in California both feels alienating and like a relief. I put so much effort into so many people. I’m exhausted and drained. Here I do not do that. It’s not that I am utterly friendless here, I’m not. But I’m not pouring out buckets of energy begging people to love me anymore.

That feels better and worse. In some ways that begging feels so integral to my personhood. Cheezeits this house and yard are so much more work than I had there that I couldn’t put so much energy into a social life if I wanted to. I feel worn to the bone. I feel like this move half killed me. So much has gone wrong this year. And I feel like I am a terrible liar because I didn’t take a year of rest. I don’t know how that could have happened. Not with everything that has happened that has been entirely outside my control. The only thing I could have done to seriously lower my work load would have been not painting the dining room. That was the expendable thing. Even my puttering in the garden was never a big drain, not really.

I had intended to spend a lot of this year working on fitness. I am so depressed and overwhelmed and out of cope that I have not done so, which may be part of why I feel so bad. I’m not sure what to do about it though.

I was talking to T last night and we were discussing the climate crisis and political crisis stuff going on around the world. He said that he kind of pities me because he has it much easier than me. He’s 50 and he expected to die long ago and when he goes it will make a few people a little bit sad but it won’t really alter anyone’s life much. I have kids. I have to work like a dog to extend my life and keep giving to them long, long past when he is allowed to just quit. I can’t quit, not ever. I have to rage against the dying of the light and do everything in my power to help these little people be safe and ok in the future.

I am absolutely convinced that I wouldn’t still be trying so hard without them. I have mixed feelings about that. And our sweet baby extended the childhood period by a decade. I will spend thirty solid years with children I need to house and feed and take care of. I’ve already been doing this for over 12 years. It’s a lot. I’m not that far into the second decade and I have a third way off in the distance. It is daunting to think about sometimes. Will I be a withered husk with no genuine emotions left at all?

I would say it’s just a bad day. But it’s been a bad week in a rough month in a worse year.

But I love the trees I see out my window. I am grateful I will soon have room for more fruit trees. I have every intention of donating whatever I can’t can/use. I like seeing the hills and the firth off in the distance. I see plants and some sort of flowers almost around the calendar here. It’s becoming autumn and the trees are slowly beginning to change. It’s nice.

For a couple of months now I have wanted to decorate for Christmas. I don’t know if it is that I want to borrow Christmas cheer or if I want the year to just hurry up and fucking end already or if I want to feel like I am getting ahead on my to do list so maybe I can rest more. To be fair, I have rested a lot more over the last week and some. I caught a cold. It’s not fucking corona but I have to take the test anyway because otherwise EC can’t be at school. One of my buddies as a nurse and when I described my constant fall/winter funk she said it sounded like chronic bronchitis. Meh. It doesn’t really matter. I won’t do anything about it.

I am so tired. I sleep. Not worse than in the past and maybe even better. Doesn’t matter. I miss massage and chiropractic care. I like not spending very much money on life though. I feel like I’m doing a lot of waiting for time to pass. Waiting to see if I have hope again. Waiting to see if I will ever feel better.

Right now I doubt it.