Sunday, February 3, 2013

It's deja vu all over again. Sigh.

At least the critter didn't see his shadow yesterday.
It's that twitchy time of year for me.  It usually starts sometime in mid-January -- not long after the holiday haze wears off, but before the days begin to lengthen appreciably.  Maybe it has something to do with flipping the calendar page.  Or with the knowledge that the weather will be icky for at least another month, and there's nothing I can do about it.  In any case, I always seem to suffer an attack of disgruntlement at this time of year.

I'm not a SAD (seasonal affective disorder) sufferer.  It's not the lack of light, really; as an office denizen, I spend most of my daylight hours inside anyway.  And it's not a full-blown case of depression.  It's just that -- I dunno -- there's not a lot to look forward to right now.

Observing Imbolc helps me.  The beginning of February marks the halfway point of winter, and so Imbolc is a reminder that it won't be cold/gray/snowy forever.  (We had some conversational snow this weekend -- enough to make all the drivers freak out, but not enough to ice up the pavement.  Don't get me started on DC drivers in the snow.)  Winter weather in the mid-Atlantic tends to wrap up by the spring equinox.  I can remember one year when we had a serious snowfall around the middle of March -- we had to delay my older daughter's sixth birthday party by a week, which ought to give you a clue about how long ago it was -- but that's the latest that I can remember seeing a significant accumulation here.

Things were different when I was growing up.  Back when I was walking to school uphill both ways (it's a joke, okay? I rode a bus to school! And not the short bus, either, smarty pants!), we had to step over snowbanks to go trick-or-treating in October, and spring lasted about a day and a half.  I like to tell this to people who have grown up around here, just to see the horror in their eyes.  Muahaha.

(I have a bad feeling that I've told the trick-or-treating story here before.  If I've bored you with it multiple times, I apologize.)

Anyway, I didn't intend to make this post about the weather.  It's just that the gray skies are part of my general disgruntlement.  But my real problem is that another year has passed and I feel like I'm spinning my wheels and not getting anywhere.  I think I need a talking-to, and I'm just the person to deliver it:

"Okay, Cantwell, listen up.  Short term, you've got just two more weeks before you get another three-day weekend, and your sweater's almost done.  Longer term, you'll be in Indy next month -- and you get to take the train, which will be a hoot!  And you're going to Alaska in late May.  Now there's a milestone -- once you get to Alaska, you will have visited all fifty states, and you'll have just one more destination left on your bucket list!  That's pretty cool, huh?  And not only have you been a published author for a couple of years now, but you'll be wrapping up the Pipe Woman Chronicles this spring.  And don't forget that you just bought yourself a really nice podcasting mic, just in case you get the urge to make some books-on-tape or something. Just because you're still in DC doesn't mean you're not making progress.  It's a marathon, not a sprint, okay?"

Okay, okay, you're right.  These bleak days will pass.  But just so you know, Pep Talk Deliverer, we'll probably have to do this again next year.

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This moment of bloggy malaise is brought to you, as a public service, by . (Sigh.)

2 comments:

Jer said...

Just stopping by from Indies :) I've added your blog to my RSS reader.

Lynne Cantwell said...

Thanks, Jer, and welcome!