Sometimes, the numbers don’t add up.
If you take out the complete meltdown I had a few weeks ago that, upon reflection, wasn’t at all about aging, locked accounts, mobile phone stores, and my now up-and-running, “top of the line” iPhone SE, I’ve been pretty quick to pat myself on my portly back for climbing out of the multiyear depressive hole I found myself in up until September 19th, 2022 (the day the Not Dead Yet Comeback Special started).
However, despite actually feeling better than I have in years, upon closer look, I’m not sure if I’m actually doing THAT better or not, at least according to the numbers.
Wifey would be the first to tell you that I have improved a ton since starting therapy a few years ago, getting rid of Mindbender II (The Wrath of Kahn), and finally getting my Lexapro sorted out with Mindbender III (A New Hope). Additionally, I’m getting outside almost every day for my lumbers, I’m feeling fitter than I have in years, I feel comfortable in my own skin again, and overall, I feel better about myself. However, sometimes I feel like I might just be papering over the cracks, as they say, and emotionally regressing by simply avoiding everything. Because, you know, the numbers say I am.
I started thinking about all this after dinner on Thanksgiving when Wifey, B, and I watched the movie Fargo. I’ve seen the movie many times, but I soon realized that this was the first movie I watched from start to finish since 2021’s viewing of The French Dispatch with the same audience. And don’t get me started on going to a movie theatre; that goes back to 2017. Having said that, we watched another favorite of mine on Friday (Snatch), so that made two!
Then I started thinking about some other numbers that I will try to limit to the last 365 days.
- Books bought or given to me: 6
- Books finished: 0
- Movies watched start to finish in one sitting: 2 (See above, thanks, B!)
- Meals eaten in a restaurant: 0
- Nights out with friends: 2 (once in public, once at their home)
- Nights out for a concert or show: 1 (Bad Friends back in April)
- Nights out with Wifey: 3-ish (1 Bad Friends’ show, plus with our good friends twice )
- Vacations taken: 0
- Weekends away: 0
- Trips taken longer than a trip to East Lansing: 1 (also Bad Friends)
- Times out of the state of Michigan: 0 (since April 2022)
- Athletic Events Attended: 0
What does this prove? Well, not much other than I should give a shout-out to Bobby and Andrew from Bad Friends because that one comedy show really helped pad those pretty dismal numbers.
The realization that I may not be as un-depressed as I though was also being compounded by what was surely the real reason behind my mental meltdown a few weeks ago: my perceived expectations that we make it back to Pennsylvania for Christmas this year, but owning a dog that is too hobbled and needs too much care to stay in a kennel while we’re gone, too old to travel, and too loved to let go right now. Basically, we’re in the same sinking dog boat as last Christmas, but it’s this Christmas.
In the end it worked out, and my father was very understanding. So there’s that.
Of course, I am mostly joking about caring about those numbers above, and I realize that they might be a tad shocking to some, however things like not eating in restaurants are because I love to cook, not because I’m depressed. And the lack of events attended has more to do with living 2+ hours away from good music and shows (I’m not much for the 99.9% of the folks that play the nearby casino). And while I’m not reading many books or watching many movies, I am listening to more music than I have in a few years; I have a number of podcasts I listen to, a number of YouTube channels that I enjoy, and, of course, my football (soccer) watching obsession.
Still, I’d like to improve the social numbers in 2024. Because as much as I love the numbers I’m putting up in the woods (22 hikes/119.16 miles in November, 1,529.63 miles and counting lumbered since the start of the Comeback Special), my brain needs to start engaging and sharing experiences with people again—something I really haven’t enjoyed since COVID, when I was given world-wide approval to just stay at home.
All in good time, but for now, I’m just going to keep putting one foot in front of the other and see where I end up.
Later.
NOTE: I try to avoid such things these days. but I gave myself permission to write about my mental health today.
THE SOILED SOUNDS TRACK OF THE POST
As a long-time fan of The Libertine and Babyshambles, I find Pete Doherty a fascinating figure in the same way I am always drawn to tragic and or near-tragic drug-loving, booze-swilling, frontmen, and personalities (See Anthony Bourdain, Ian Curtis, Nick Cave, Hunter S. Thompson, the list goes on). In fact, Doherty’s recent biography is one of the 6 books I bought, started, and didn’t finish this year. I’ll get to it someday!
Just paper over the cracksAnd there ain’t no turning back
I was actually going to post Run Run Run, the new track from The Libertines, but as I was writing this post, Pipedown popped into my head for some reason, and here we are.