Malaise

You can tell it's winter. My brain has gone into post-holiday hibernation, and I find it hard to dredge up enthusiasm for writing about anything this week. The weather is frigid, our hot water heater (for the third time this fall/winter season) is on the fritz, snow seems to be perpetually in the forecast, if not on the ground, and I am tired of every recipe in my files, and am patently unwilling to move along in the organizational plan I once had for: (name one or include all) the house, my writing, losing weight, beginning an exercise program...even, god help me, for reading a book or two.

Nothing is right. Everything requires too much effort. No one is doing their job (at least in my book), and I am suffering fools on a day-to-day basis--and NOT gladly, I might add. I am bored--and boring, incapable of creative thought or action. I feel like my refrigerator--full of dribs and drabs of wilted old vegetables and unappetizing plastic tubs of leftovers. I feel like my garden--frost-bitten and languishing under gray clouds and dead trees. I am television without sweeps week, a schedule of perpetual reruns. I am my computer without Wi-Fi, disconnected and drifting. I am Einstein without an idea, a musician without a melody, a Broadway play without an audience, an endless visit with my mother.

I am always one tick off the mark, one ingredient short in every recipe, one errand unaccomplished, one forgotten item at the grocery store. I've written too few notes, failed to meet deadlines, forgot to call, neglected to vacuum, started too late or left too early. I am perpetually disappointed by everyone and everything, and am crabby and cranky and put-upon. I am annoyed by everything and pleased by far too little. I should smile more.

And yet. The days are getting infinitesimally longer. I have good friends who have (apparently) been overlooking my abysmal moods. We are planning a long visit to sunny San Diego. And if I put on my Pollyanna hat, I can see that I have more pros than cons in my life. January will soon be gone. As will February. March will give way to April, and spring may yet reappear. I. Can't. Wait.