Being depressed isn’t fun.

Depression takes you forty-five minutes to talk yourself into getting out of bed on a Sunday morning only to miss the hourly bus to get to church by twenty seconds as it drives past you on your desperate attempt to run as fast as you can to make it and somehow not die, slipping on the ice.

And it drives right past you.

Depression makes you meaningfully consider whether or not you’re better off getting out of bed before work with enough time shower, or whether you’d rather avoid having to deal with the world just for fifteen more minutes.

Fifteen precious, frightening minutes.

… When you’ve been trying to get back to sleep for the past one hundred and thirty-seven. But you can’t. Because you’re convinced your body hates you.

Which exasperates you further, frustrating and exaggerating the problem you thought you’d dealt with years ago, but you know better by now. Because it’s sure happened enough.

Ticking down the clock. Enjoying the sweet freedom. But how long until next time?

Being an introvert and working in customer service doesn’t help on days like today either; when you’re burnt out from people and trying to deal with the shit in your own head.

Cycling and cycling.

Aside from the fact I’d much rather get paid to write than still be working customer service (happy seven years), I guess that’s one of the reasons I’m writing this book.

I’m about twenty thousand words into the second draft of a fifty-four thousand (and two) word(s) manuscript about a high school kid dealing with severe depression and suicidal tendencies at the beginning of a fresh school year after dealing with the tragic death of his girlfriend at the end of the last one.

Aside from the fact I’m not suicidal any more by the specific grace of God (though I have been) and that I’ve never had a girlfriend die on me (though I’ve lost so many people, I literally can’t remember how many), it’s not something I’m exactly writing without experience. A lot of it. A truly profound amount.

More than I would ever wish on anyone.

When it’s done and released to the masses, I hope that aside from a great story, I will be able to give people that are or have been genuinely, truly depressed without any visible way out something they can relate to.

To give them hope.

– Chris

(I hope you understand that my brain is fixed into the next town.)