a wolf angel is not a good angel

I am such a wimp about pain.

An *additive* is not the same as a *chemical*. Your organic whatevers are full of chemicals! Drinking water: same deal! Stop talking about not buying things “full of chemicals”, unless you’re buying a vacuum.

Last night was a bad night. I tossed and turned, sleeping in small bits, for six hours, maybe seven. Matilda sat and looked sympathetic as I took hot bath after hot bath.

I’m still sick. It’s sort of changing symptoms: headachy one day, nauseous the next, then dizzy, then with a fever, and on and on. I don’t know what this means, probably that it’s all in my head, or done by my head, not a virus or bacterium. But I’m not any less sick for all that. Physical symptoms give me something to point to, at least.

I have to call back a friend, who asked if I were feeling better, and a co-owner, to say that no, I am not free this Wednesday for part two of the annual meeting. (It was supposed to be last week, but I stopped checking my voice mail for a while. I don’t know if it was cancelled initially or just when I didn’t bother to show up. I think the former, cause I didn’t get the minutes beforehand. I was too sick anyhow.)

But I bought May Wests today. May West? It feels like it should be a mass noun for some reason. They were on sale and I had been craving them, as had my friend, and so we split a box, and I ate one when I got home. Not ideal when I’m sick but I don’t know what kind of sick I am.

Matilda seems desperate for something, but I don’t know what. I feel like I am being cruel to her.

My grandmother says that the place where I was going to get my hair coloured has a terrible colourist. Don’t get it coloured there! So, um, I won’t. Okay. I am getting it coloured where my sister got highlights done last year (looked wonderful!), and I’ll turn the appointment into just the haircut, because I am feeling the urge to go at my hair with scissors. I hate split ends.

Work from home bonus: hair being done at 10 am Tuesday. Maybe bonus: less time to chicken out.

Today I am intending to get something that will function like a doorbell. And maybe curtain stuff or fabric to recover my icky dining room chairs. And I will return some books I bought but don’t think I really want. I wish it were warmer. I need to get my bike realigned for spring, though first I have to find out where it is. I’m hopeful that next weekend will be nice enough to bike, at least a little, maybe on the canal, to the old port or to Ste-Anne-de-Bellevue. I live somewhere that there are interesting places to bike to: I want to start to take advantage of that.

Wow. I must have slept . . . a lot. I was sick yesterday, so I passed on dinner. (Saw the play: I’m voting for very poor translation, because it was terrible, but it played to sold out houses for ages in French.) I got home, took a hot bath around 5.30, maybe? Then someone knocked but I pretended I didn’t hear it. (Avoidance, my dear friend! But I wasn’t expecting anyone. Actually maybe this was before the bath.) Went to bed shortly after that. It took me a little bit of time to fall asleep, and I woke up a few times having to go to the bathroom or get something to drink, but that’s probably a good 12 hours I slept. I am still tired — one night of extra sleep certainly doesn’t make up for months of insufficient sleep — but it’s less draggy.

I am going out to breakfast with my grandparents in 2 hours, which gives me enough time to get hungry. I’ve been thinking about what I would order since they invited me out. Pancakes or eggs? Or perhaps the pancake / slice of french toast / half waffle extravaganza? Oh, the decisions.

So I actually went out last night. And I am going out today, and tomorrow. (Movie, play and dinner, brunch and then something else.) And it’s all good, except for how tired I am. I am really tired. Not that staying in would make me less tired.

I really want to write something about presentation. It is entirely true that I have been and still am very depressed. But it is equally true that I can (often, but not always) pretend to be ok for a few hours and convince myself of it. I cannot always force myself out, but when I can, I can often forget that I am unhappy, sort of. It’s hard to explain, and probably it’s due a lot to the fact that I try to be private about how I feel. (Okay, sure, this blog suggests otherwise, but the nature of any sort of online communication makes it feel private to me, somehow.)

And so I do focus on one here, because it is the best outlet for me (and, also, pretty much the only outlet I will let myself have: but writing has always been the best outlet, though I am heavily self-censoring about the depression), and because it is true. But it’s not everything, and sometimes that is a lie by omission. And so I feel dishonest here, writing about how I am walking through a fog of misery, because I’m not *always* (although a week or so ago I was pretty much that low, now I am low but functional); I feel dishonest going out and smiling or laughing, because I come home and wish I could cry.

I know everyone has different facets, things they show at different times to different people, and I know that’s reasonable. But at the same time, I sometimes find it worrisome when people have sides that are too dissimilar (ignoring things like: acting very different at work, or in front of your great-grandmother). Are they trying too hard to be whoever they are with wants them to be? Is it all true? What does true mean, in this context? Am I disliking it because I do it? It seems somehow that depression is more like a different colour filter being put on than an entirely different side — but maybe I am making excuses for myself, trying to tell myself this isn’t hypocritical.

This post isn’t clear, and I know it. But the issues aren’t clear in my head either.

After, oh, half my life red, and after thinking about it for many months, I have made an appointment to dye my hair back to its natural colour. And also get a haircut, because I have split ends that are *this close* to taking over the world. I just hope my roots will be long enough to really see, so we can effectively match my hair colour. It will have been, I don’t know, a long time since I last did it, and last week my mother suggested two weeks from now so — next Saturday it is.

Unless I chicken out first.

Intriguingly, one of the cars on this side of the road has a ticket. It’s not in a spot where you need a sticker to park. The last no parking period on this side of the road was Tuesday, so it’s unlikely from that. There’s no hydrant or other no parking sign. I can’t really figure out what else might have resulted in a ticket.

Update: possibly someone put the ticket back on the car in order to avoid receiving another ticket today?

Update^2: Nope, car was moved before the no parking time started. Other cars were not, but no tickets today either.

My parents and sister went to Whistler to ski this week. (My uncle lives there.) They left this morning, got on a standby to Vancouver instead of via Toronto. I hope they have a wonderful time.

But as this impacts me: it’s good, because it might mean I don’t end up heading over there every single night. (My other sister, who makes nasty remarks every time she sees me over, is still there.) It’s bad, because if I don’t end up going there, am I likely to do anything else instead? And because I haven’t gone grocery shopping in, um, a long time. My mother brought me strawberries, bananas and apples yesterday; she also gave me her leftover sauted onions and mushrooms, a bit of vegepate and some oatmeal squares. (Right now the thought of food is . . . unappealing.) I also have a couple of eggs and some milk, as well as chipotle peppers, more vegepate, coffee ice cream and those weird frozen fruit pulp things.

I don’t usually stop eating when I am depressed, so this is a strange new thing for me. It’s not that I’m not hungry (though I’m not hungry for *long*), it’s just that I can’t be bothered. Which makes it easier at my parents’ house: they have a meal *already made*. And also, I am trying to act okay-er, because then maybe I will be okay.