depression

You Yell In Your Head A Lot

/ Sloan / Leave a comment

That day at work, the one that is so mind numbingly boring where you can’t even remember what you talk about. You sit and stare, you cross and un-cross your legs to keep your ankles from going numb. That day where you know you’re not going to want to go home right away so you make plans with an old friend, you find a new bar and you plant your ass on a stool for a few beers and talk.

You talk and the shit that comes out of your mouth sometimes makes you realize that, in this moment, your voice is unrecognizable. You’re half way through your first 8% beer and you realize the bar now looks blurry, only because you’re looking through saltwater and your friend pats your right shoulder.

Looking down, your left knee is supported by the bar while your right ankle crosses over it, you look over and your bearded friend, a friend from years ago, that is only ten years younger that your father, and his legs are crossed the same way.

For as long as I’ve known you, you’ve been like a strong, proud, black woman. He says, lifting his hand off your shoulder, complimenting you. He begins to share his stories about his relationship, because you decide to get another beer and change the subject to him. You want to stop looking through saltwater and getting the focus off you will help that.

The bar fills up as you realize the coffee stout you ordered is actually good. After years of loving coffee and loving beer and hating the two combined, this brewery does it–it goes down easy, lights you up with a buzz and mellows you out with a different buzz. The conversation continues onto beers, breweries, brewers and bars.

He compartmentalizes your life by drawing circles and squares on the bar top with his fingers, connecting them with imaginary lines and arrows, showing how they all really are connected–see, if things are good here, they have the potential to be better HERE, he taps hard on the upper right circle,

Meanwhile, you use your thumbnail to pick the coaster and to avoid eye contact, you’ve been refused coaster use in bars you regulared at in the past but the tender doesn’t notice you tonight. You blink back, close your eyes a moment and return to making scraps that he’ll later have to clean up and throw away–you’ve worked at bars and know how annoying it is to clean up other peoples messes.

The four compartments are all different, yet work together, if you create balance, you equal a happy, healthy life. Who can juggle balance? Where does this come from? WHERE, HOW?! You yell in your head, you yell in your head a lot.

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There’s Gotta Be More

/ Sloan / 1 Comment

I had an entire post written. Then I deleted it because, well, it was pathetic and self depreciating and no on wants to hear that.

I found myself journal-ing about not really having the desire to seek out new things. Not having the desire to have ‘life altering conversations’. I do have them, few and far between, usually via text to a friend in Oregon or Pennsylvania or Colorado. Conversations about fear, desires, dreams: I used to have over a coffee, or a beer, or after too many beers. These are good, earth shattering conversations. Ones that are meant to change the world, change my life, or change the life of someone else.

Now most of conversations consist of topics like: beer, farm to table food, the proper form to do a lateral pull down. Running. How bad the winter sucks in Chicago. How bad the CTA sucks in Chicago. How we can’t wait for summer. Day drinking on patios.  All legit conversations to have, but pretty easy and unremarkable. Though Chicago does have some really great patios to drink on…

But wait. Wait wait wait. What I can’t figure out is if I have changed or gotten lazy. Or if I don’t have the people around me to have these convos with. OR everyone around me actually has their shit so together that they don’t crave conversations about life, energy, love, nature… I do believe that I’ve changed, changed in the sense that I recognized my need to stop running away from what ever it is I run from. But that recognition shouldn’t hinder me from exploration connections. Is this what getting old is like?

[Side note, I’m in Chicago another year guys… this’ll be a record for me]

But I do think we need to go back to conversations about more than just patio drinking and money. I dream of traveling. I dream of being successful and stable. I dream of doing more than just going through the motions.

I guess that’s what life feels like at the moment. Just going through the motions.

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shutupshutupshutup

/ Sloan / 1 Comment

I’ve been mean lately. Like, nasty, snarky and rude. The person on the other end of my meanness should probably unfriend me on Facebook and basically cut me out of her life. The things that have popped up and have been communicated are hard to hear, probably not true and borderline insane.
I can’t, however, unfriend myself. I can’t turn and walk away from my inner voice. I can’t yell and scream and tell her to “SHUT UP” and expect it to stop. My brain, my inner voice and inner self talk has been crude and awful for the past week.

You’re so anti-social.
You should have gone for a longer run.
Why did you eat that?
What are you doing with your life?
How are you paying rent this month?
You’re really not good at anything, just quit.
Why are you like her?

I sit here and type some of the things that run through my head, think other things and can’t bring myself to share everything. It’s that bad.

SHUT UP.

Doesn’t work. Damnit. I’m truly, in general, a happy person here in Chicago. Happier than I have been in the past, but this voice… who is she and how do we silence her? Sometimes I go for a run and listen to her, try and reason and argue. Other times I convince people to meet me at the bar and I shut her up with a few beverages, she’s quiet while I’m surrounded by friends, but she gets angry when I’m home alone in bed–Why did you have that last glass of wine? You spent too much money. Are those people really even your friends? This voice makes me cancel Skype dates with my best friends, she pulls me down onto the couch, turns on Netflix and says “Tomorrow, tomorrow will be clearer and sunnier, and better. Tomorrow.”

Tomorrow is bullshit. What if there is no tomorrow? You can’t just turn a voice off. I’m trying to end this post on a positive note without sounding cheesy and I’m not sure how to do that. Cheese might be the only answer. Since we can’t shut our inner voices up, maybe take what they say with a grain of salt–work as hard as you have been, and also acknowledge “at least I WENT for a run today…” Being kinder to ourselves can be hard, we’re all our own worse critic and have the tendency to just be mean. So I guess it comes down to treating yourself with respect, realizing that the things that pop into my head I would NEVER say aloud to another person–so why am I treating myself like that.

Not cool Sloan, not cool.

So on that cheese filled note, a new goal is set in place for myself and I challenge you all to join, be nice. Be nice to yourself, take note and acknowledge your accomplishments as well as the path you are on. I’m writing this to pump myself up for it–it’s a daily struggle and I’m on that bus trying to be happy and live a life full of learning and moving forward. Because forward is the only way to go.