Fall has fell

"Summer has come and passed
The innocent can never last
wake me up when september ends" *


I don’t like this time of year. The weather can’t make up its mind what it wants to do; 40 in the morning, 80 in the afternoon. Mother Nature with menopause. I want to scream ‘just pick one already’. As TJ's double post below shows, I'm not the only one.

The days become shorter and I sleep longer and longer in the morning, unwilling to face the day. I have seasonal affective disorder (SAD) and it just really screws with me around now. I know how the bears feel—I eat more and I’m ready to hibernate until spring. I sit directly under a lamp with a full sun bulb all day long—maybe it helps some. It’s hard to tell. I get cranky, moody, depressed, generally unsatisfied with life and myself. Only slightly different than PMS, not that I think it helps Fozzie much.

I’m usually good until the first cold snap, and then I begin snapping too. The afternoon temperature climb does not fool me, nor do anything to improve my mood because now the sweats I jumped into from bed are too hot to wear. And the too hot feeling only lasts until right after I make dinner; then the sun sinks quickly and the house goes cold. SIGH And I hate being cold, with a passion. Once I get cold, it takes forever for me to warm back up. Thin blood I guess.

Fall signals the beginning of the holiday season—Ho fucking Ho. Christmas depresses me, almost always has. Its used to be a time for the family to get together and celebrate the birth of the man who came to save us all from our sins and give us everlasting life. Now it is a commercial nightmare that begins in the stores in September and runs thru the rest of the year. It’s all about outdoing, showing off, pretending we all get along for one fucking day, and being disappointed when we don’t. Well, you can keep that shit, I refuse to play.

My family has a hard time understanding how uncomfortable I am with the holidays. All that forced familiarity just gets on my last freakin nerve, and with the change of the seasons, my nerves are already shot. I much prefer to stay home.

I have friends out there of various religious faiths and we have been known to celebrate “Un-Xmas” at my house. There is no tree, there are no decorations, there are no gifts—the JW’s have the right idea for once, and they are welcome at my house. My mother refers to JW's as 'godless heathens' because they do not celebrate Xmas. This is more than a little amusing when you recall that the Xtians took over all the Pagan holidays in the first place. The pagans celebrate the Solstice around 21 December, marking the longest night of the year. After the Solstice, the days start getting just a little longer, marking the return of the sun. I am all for more sunshine, and so the pagans are welcome at my house too.

Matter of fact, all faiths and those of no faith are welcome and none are preached around my kitchen table, especially at the holidays. And that’s the way I like it. Growl. Now leave me the fuck alone until Spring gets here.

"wake me up when september ends
wake me up when september ends
wake me up when september ends" *

*Wake me up when September ends, 2004, Green Day