I started this blog post three times. I hate April.

Why does spring have to be so cruel?  I hate the month of April.  I hate the slimy muck left behind by melting snowbanks, the litter left at the side of the roads, and the mud.  I hate the way I don't feel that happy enthusiasm I see on almost everybody else.  

I hate the weather.  It tricks me.  One day it's ten degrees above freezing and we're ready to put away the heavy winter coats.  The lawn looks like it's drying up.  I feel a tiny glimmer of hope.  The next day, I wake up to a coating of wet snow on every surface, and the snow falls for two days straight.  It always snows in April here, and every year we want to forget.  "It's unfair" we whine, but it's normal.  It's the foolish optimists who trust the fickle weather!

I hate the totally unreasonable misery I drag around.  It's stupid; I have a good life.  I didn't ask to be miserable and it bothers me no end that I have to work so hard to shake it off.

I know I'm better this year than I was last year.  I tell myself that every day.  I wear myself out, correcting every little negative thought.

I know them.  I know how they sneak into my brain.  I tell myself it's the depression talking and that I really don't want to leave my husband or stay in bed all day without eating anything, or drive into a brick wall or spend the whole day swallowing every pill in the house and washing it down with every bottle of wine I can smash open.  I really don't want to do any of those things. 

I don't particularly want  to do anything.  That's the problem.

I realize that once I get going I'll be okay.  If I can talk myself into getting out of the house and into the truck, and just put my brain in auto-pilot long enough to drive out to the Little Valley, I'll be in a place I like spending time in.  Once I pick a horse and saddle her up, I'll want to stay there on her back for awhile.  I feel ashamed that it takes such effort to do something I enjoy.  Worse, in order to reach a goal I set for myself, I have to ride, and I hate it that I can make it feel like an obligation rather than what it really is- something I love to do.

I am fully aware of what I need to do to get through this disgusting muddy indecisive time of year.  

I need to get out of bed in the morning and stay out of it.  No matter how tired I am I should stay awake and get active rather than let myself snooze.  Getting my days and nights turned around won't help me at all.

I need to take the Pug for a walk.  He gets a walk every day, but it's not always enough for him, and I know I could use it too.  What excuse do I have for skimping on it? Oh, y'know, I'm tired, it's cold, I was on the computer too long and now I have to get going so his walk gets cut short.  We should be out there for a good 45 minute haul, at least.  

I need to blast myself with that big light lamp every morning.  I try to do a half hour, while I eat breakfast.  It hurts my eyes.  Not pleasant.  But I do think it improved my sleep, and that's important.  

I need to ride more often, and really ride, not just dawdle along.  I need that sense of accomplishment.  It's been over a year since I passed my last rider level test.  It's time. 

I need to write.  It's been proven over and over that if I don't write, bad things happen.  I get bad-crazy.  I doesn't even matter what - I just need to let some words out.  It's like a pressure release valve.  I might go back in a few months when I'm feeling a little more like myself and be amazed at how bad all that word pollution is, but that's irrelevant.  I just gotta write and if I'm lucky, I can dig something good out of it.  

The worst part, the absolute worst, is that it's so easy to do these things.  Soooo easy.  And yet I spend a huge amount of energy talking myself into it.  

At least I know what to do, and I know that it won't last. Even if I can't see that light, I know it's there.  

It's a long weekend.  It's a celebration of death and life and the triumph of life over death.  Symbolic?  It is for me, more and more every year.  

I'm planning on getting some much needed churchin' this weekend, along with some much needed horse time and family time.  I wish you all a good weekend, however you'll be celebrating, and I'll be back here on Tuesday.