Oh mister sandman
Leave me alone!
I had big plans today
To get some things done

Instead I spent all day
Asleep in the clover
I hope these sleepy times
Will soon be over!

To the tune of this, of course.

So yeah, having one of those darned sleepy days today.

The first day of a sleepy period is usually okay. I sleep a lot, but it’s pleasant enough sleep. The dream density is high, but I am well enough inside that things dont’e get too dark or too surreal. The sleep is fairly relaxed and comes easily. It’s annoying to sleep all day when you had things you wanted to get done, but otherwise, it’s fine.

It’s when these periods linger on that it gets unpleasant. Sleep feels less like a Little Nemo picture and more like something by Hieronymous Bosch with the flu. I end up feeling sick through and through, and falling asleep seems like succumbing to a disease than wholesome rest.

So tomorrow, I am going to fight this thing. I will let it have today, but tomorrow I am going to make a point of getting up and moving around and getting fresh air and in general try to stimulate myself out of this state.

And it has to be physical stimulation, the kind you can get by moving. Mental stimulation won’t cut it, I stimulate my mind all day. I have developed a thick layer of resistance. I have to move. Get my circulation going. Get some cardio going.

Which means I really should go down to the second floor to check out the recreation area. We’ve lived here since last September and I still haven’t been down there. It’s not like it would take a huge effort to do it, either. It’s just an elevator trip away.

Plus they remodeled it recently, so there is a chance there is an actual gym there now instead of three consumer level exercise bikes and a lot of empty space.

I could even use my tablet like a Walkman (I am so old) and further socially insulate myself.

There is a wardrobe issue. I don’t have any gym clothes that fit. Well, pants, specifically. I have plenty of T-shirts, and my shoes would be adequate to the task.

But I have no gym pants that actually fit me. The two pairs I have won’t stay up without suspenders, and even if I was prepared to face the social embarrassment of being since in gym shorts and suspenders in public, it would make working out REALLY hard.

I mean, my suspenders spontaneously release just from brushing up against the back of a chair. They would not last a minute on an exercise bike or lifting weights with a Universal gym.

Plus I am out of excuses not to at least go a little ways from home. My bus pass has surely been activated by now and so I could go anywhere in the GVRD for free. There must be some free (or very cheap) stuff out there which I would enjoy. I could make a fun little trip of it.

My model for that sort of thing is my friend and roomie Julian. He is far more timid and shy than I am. And yet he regularly goes all over the place doing things which interest him. If he can do it, why can’t I?

No pressure, though. Pressure destroys. Desire inspires. The secret, for me, is to think about what I will enjoy about the thing I want to do, and let the desire for that enjoyment inspire me.

Thus, I concentrate on rewards, not obligations or the “smart” thing to do.

Motivation is a tricky thing, and it rarely acts in the simplistic way that an overdeveloped superego thinks it does. Motivation comes from the id, and a stifled and suppressed id doesn’t motivate anybody. You cannot punish yourself into action.

This is nto easy to learn. At least, not for me. I find myself envious of people who had to learn everything the hard way. Normally I pity those people, but in their own blind way, they know some things I don’t because they refused to accept any limitation excepts the ones that actually exist in the world, and even then, they keep looking for a shortcut.

That kind of unrelenting force of self seems quite foreign, even alien to me. My lifelong insistence on caution, sensibility, and thinking things through precludes that kind of exuberance of spirit. And while I might watch these people crashing into the same walls over and over again and shake my head in wonder at how anyone can be that stupid, well, stupid is as stupid does and I am the one who has spent the last twenty years housebound and they have gone on to have lives and jobs and spouses and such.

I’m working on it.

Of course, they have the advantage of being able to draw on the strength of the herd. They don’t have to invent an entire self for themselves before they can even function. They didn’t climb to the peak of Philosopher’s Mountain to enjoy the view then look down and realize they had no idea how they were going to get back down. By being ignorant of them, they let society mold them into something like a functional citizen whereas I, by being extremely aware of them, end up a very old tadpole.

At least I am not calling myself a hothouse flower any more. I have made peace with that. So what if I am a not exactly a rugged all-terrain drought proof specimen? I’m a little bit magic, and that’s all that counts.

It’s growing the fuck up that is the hard part. Maybe that is all that us depressives have to do, when it comes right down to it. Figure out that, despite out biological age and our flashy intellects, we are but children inside, and our salvation comes from growing up to be bigger and stronger than our sad little issues.

I will talk to you nice people again tomorrow.