I'm a little worried that I might be starting to get seasonal depression again. I had it really bad 3 years ago but the past two winters, I was fine. I think mostly because I was outside a lot at school. But I'm starting to feel like I did those 3 years ago when I had no motivation, no interest in anything, was cranky and slept the entire winter away. I didn't feel sad, per se, I felt nothing. No excitement. No enthusiasm. No nothing. Just sleep.

Today I took Joey to school and less than an hour after I had awakened, I went back to bed until after 11pm. I felt so awful for it. Lazy. Slug-a-bed. I didn't feel like eating or doing anything. I could have slept longer, too. I wanted to stay in bed. It was only by sheer force of will that I rousted myself from that bed after lying there thinking bad thoughts about myself for a half hour.

To combat my feeling of being an absolute slug, I indulged in some guilt cleaning. That felt good, actually. I tidied up the office, which was nice. Tidied up the dining room table--it has become a repository for all the stuff people carry into the house but don't know where to put when they get here. I hate it but I'm as guilty as Ed or Joey. The problem is that the stuff doesn't get resolved--it just sits there and sits there until someone gets motivated to clean it up or we have company coming. It's sad. It's annoying. It's life. Please tell me that you have such a place in your house. If you don't, please keep it to your self.

At any rate, I cleaned my house. Before I started cleaning, though, I lit the fire and then lit every candle in my house and put my new Enya CD on the stereo very loud. There was something tremendously comforting and homey about the ambient light of the candles and it lifted my energy some. The sky was dark grey and by 1pm it was pouring down rain outside. Just the kind of weather that makes me want to cook soup. I didn't have all the ingredients for soup, however, so I just cleaned the house. I even tidied up Joey's room.

I still didn't have much energy, though. I had so much energy this summer--on the go go go all the time time time. I'm hard pressed to get to the grocery store in a timely manner. I've had a notice of a parcel at the post office that my inlaws sent me for my birthday since Friday and I haven't picked it up yet. I'm so lame.

I was supposed to go to a PTAC meeting tonight and my neighbor was going to ride with me but she called me up this afternoon and said she was having a lazy evening feeling and wanted to stay home and make soup. I thought to myself, "that sounds good" and I lost in entire motivation to go. I just couldn't drag myself out that door tonight. Ed didn't offer any motivation to go either so I just stayed home. It was pretty nice, actually. I liked having a peaceful evening. No soccer practice, no meeting, nothing. Ahhh.

The strange thing is that after all that sleep I got this morning, you'd think I'd be up all night but by 9pm, I was exhausted again. I sat down on the couch and started to fall asleep. At 9:15, Ed startled me and I woke up again. But I could easily crawl in bed and go to sleep again until tomorrow. I wonder if I should ride this out or call my doctor. I think I might give it a few more days or so to see if this is a fluke, or if maybe I'm coming down with something or if it's the start of another depression.

After school today, Joey told me, in the strictest of confidence, that she likes Zane. On the first day of school, he told her that he liked her and then a few weeks ago, he hugged her when they were standing in line together and said he liked her again. She's so cute and shy and embarrassed when she talked about him. It is so sweet and so tender and I really love it. I love how she'll come up to me with a very shy little voice and ask me about stuff. She can barely stand to talk about it outloud, but she does want to talk about it with me. I can see that this is something I cannot ever tease her about or she'll never talk to me about it again so I've been very respectful about it. I just love watching her talk about it because I know what she is feeling inside. I was the same way at her age. I remember feeling like my stomach was going to fall out of my body when I said things like "I like him" and "I think he's my boyfriend." It's just so sweet.

Now I'm thinking it's time to go to bed. This, from the woman who *never* goes to bed before midnight. Almost ever.

--L