Depression sneaks up like a receding tide, every successive wave draws back further and further, leaving barren the rocky crevices, once home to colorful, miniature life.
A rude driver on the road, a cold brush on the shoulder of a passerby, a joke at my expense and I am tumbling into the abyss, holding back senseless tears. Where are the days when I cared not what they did or said? The days keep receding before me, taking with them the best part of who I am, or was.
Everyone was laughing at some silly joke about how I am always tired. I managed a smile and strode quickly to the office’s small kitchen and stared out its small window. Just a moment to breathe and keep at bay the onslaught of cynicism in my head. I come back, quiet, fakeness slowly suffocating me. Why can’t I converse with them, jibe for jibe? Their sarcasm bites like a poisonous snake, crippling my confidence, numbing all my sense of triviality.
I bury myself in another book, another one about adventures I can only imagine about. Vicarious, my new most used word. I read between the lines: thwarted goals, unfulfilled desires, lost dreams. In the waiting line…my new favorite song.
How can one be drowning in low tide?
I clung on more tightly to the low hanging branch. It clung back. Now we drift, two lonely souls stranded in the lonely sea. Should one let go so the other can survive? What if one of us drowns if we let go? Depression seems to love the irony.
And I am drifting farther out, losing sight of land. Parched and lost. When will I see shore again?
