Dead Canterbury lawn after a day of rain.
The señor and I are sociable but introverted, and are welcoming as a result the opportunity to sit quietly through today’s rain after several days of hot dry winds and high holiday gaiety. The high-rolling aftershocks that brought the city to a halt on Boxing Day did not shake us so hard here, behind the epicentre. Nonetheless they exerted a slowing effect, bringing back that feeling of moving through treacle and not quite being able to remember what it was we were just doing that, over a short enough time, sends even the most resolutely-maintained mood descending.
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My mood got better after Christmas, just before New Year. Right through the first part of the holidays, however, I was like a spider in water. The discharge of my responsibilities over the festival was not the catharsis for which I was hoping, but I coped externally. My mother-in-law-to-be, sensing perhaps some of my disquiet, called out to me as I left her home on Boxing Day, “Everything you do is socially acceptable to us.” It was a kind thought.
This was of course the first Christmas I spent with the señor’s family as well as my own. As the day approached I knew I was worrying unnecessarily–had I not had any number of happy evenings with them this year already (including that staple of extended families worldwide, drinking in the kitchen)?–and yet I still worried. I wanted the gifts I’d had a hand in choosing to be appropriate. “Of course they will be,” said the señor, “they’re from you”, and yet I couldn’t quite accept the idea that whatever I did would be fine. I need not have worried–the prediction was correct–but I didn’t enjoy the feeling in the days before that I was worrying far too much about everything (when not worrying at all would have been the best way to approach things) and not quite being able to stop it.
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Let's talk about my feelings
Señor Mojito [yesterday]: You don’t have some terrible childhood trauma that you haven’t told me about?
H-Bird: No; no. That’s not how it works unfortunately.
Señor Mojito [today, pointing at my grandmother's glory box]: What exactly do you keep in there?
H-Bird: All my sheet music. No, wait: childhood traumas!
The señor has spent time with me while I’ve been under the wheel before, but not since we have been living together. He is coping very well, but I think it is unsettling and a little scary for him. Depression doesn’t typically respond to the normal social cues, and once I’m down a rabbit hole of despair, even for just a few hours, it’s difficult to elicit from me predictable interactions.
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As regular readers will know, December and June are typically the times when I, not to put too fine a point on it, go a bit mental. This explains in large part my quietness here. It’s harder to detect the start of a downward journey in an environment of general cheer and contentment, but it has exerted its pull for a week or two and I must feign patience until it recedes. I am good at weathering this, though I hate it.
Depression, however, is apparently no barrier to pottering away on Facebook, so should you miss me too acutely, that is where I may be found. I will willingly play you at Scrabble, Wordscraper, Scramble or Word Twist. It is likely you can beat me with relative ease in any of these forums, so for what are you waiting?
Regular readers will also know of my fondness for Chris Christmas Rodriguez. Vote him to replace Santa, this and every year.
Among the many themes with which I could clad this year’s experiences is Meeting People from the Internet. The Christmas presence, earlier this week, of Stephen and Kathy, completed a happy trifecta which began with meeting Jo and Lisa in Wellington in February, followed by Heather and of course Fran here, around the end of the first semester.
Bearing in mind Stephen’s history as a North Islander (and allowing for cultural changes wrought by Kathy’s transplanting from south to north for the last few years) I took the elevated approach to a night out. We wended our way along the Summit Road from Dyer’s Pass to Mount Pleasant, noodled out to Scarborough for a walk on the promenade at high tide, where the surfers were being thrown against the rocks like hydro-powered lemmings, then drove back into town for dinner at the Dux and a final rendezvous with the dogs at home (“what,” said Stephen, “if it’s pronounced Soh-burn?”, which has pricked my imagination ever since).
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More about the season
28 December, 2010
in at home,commentatrix,in Aotearoa,we are family
Dead Canterbury lawn after a day of rain.
The señor and I are sociable but introverted, and are welcoming as a result the opportunity to sit quietly through today’s rain after several days of hot dry winds and high holiday gaiety. The high-rolling aftershocks that brought the city to a halt on Boxing Day did not shake us so hard here, behind the epicentre. Nonetheless they exerted a slowing effect, bringing back that feeling of moving through treacle and not quite being able to remember what it was we were just doing that, over a short enough time, sends even the most resolutely-maintained mood descending.
[click to continue…]
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