Monday, February 26, 2024

Depression, Lethargy, and/or Writers Block

Hints of excitement and promises to change the world.

I sat in front of my computer at 1:30 AM and produced nine words. It’s now 7:18.

Visions have been dancing in my head, taunting me with ideas since early January. Or maybe they are warnings. They could be premonitions—The Ghost of Christmas Future predicting misfortunes that lie ahead if I don’t unfuck myself now. I tried following the argument just write something, but nothing springs forward to elicit reminders that I will never stop, rallies that I will never quit.

Instead, my focus today is the hellhole created when everything hits this trifecta.

Does one affliction come into play before the others? When my mind refuses to ignore one of the hapless nomads running rampant—spinning their tale all hours of the day and night, but I never use my words to create the form I can touch, taste, and hear—is that when everything grinds to a halt? Perhaps the start is when my muscles refuse any activity where my body must get out of my chair, away from my desk, stop playing video chess or streaming mindless movies.

What do I blame? If I can’t name the architect, am I forced to live out the sentence it created for me? Bouts of self-pity turned to loathing as the days dragged. One by one, candidates present their case for my troubles. Multiple sclerosis progression is inevitable; perhaps I am merely in the next stage of my decline. Catchy abbreviations send me scurrying to my Google search engine when I wonder if my problem is CTE onset from multiple TBIs. Maybe I’m a fraud; my 14-year run of reaching for the low-hanging fruit of catchy quips and shitty stories has reached a cheerless close. Depression is not curable. Perhaps mine is back. Perhaps it never went away. I could be lazy.

I don’t think the possibilities are endless; none of the outcomes are pleasant.

Unless it’s just writer’s block, a debilitating and painful bout of writer’s block. As I lean forward to rap my head on the desk, my mind and voice struggle to dictate a story. My inner voice is screaming, “Write something, but don’t just write anything. Make it meaningful and put your heart into every word.”

Two more restless nights of sleep. Two more long days of agony. Somewhere in the neighborhood of 15,000 calories.

If this works, I can ignore the first two months of 2024.

I really hope it was just writer’s block.


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