TO DISSIPATE DEPRESSION #2. RENEWING OURSELVES IN SPRING

GO SHOPPING! Honestly, some people might think this is a woman's thing, but  trading, buying, selling is a human thing. We are the only species that does it. And if one doesn't do it compulsively -- and it's easy to fall into that if one is not careful -- it is a joyous thing! Important phases of my life are always heralded by a shopping spree -- not exorbitant, but like yesterday, just $150 of summer clothes. I have been in a strange limbo for many weeks now, not sleeping well, or knowing what was going on,  but just a general sense of malaise, not feeling my usual self, not sick enough to rest or well enough to do my doing, but yesterday, thanks to another of my 'vices' of which I shall perhaps speak shortly, and the shopping, I have understood what is going on and am happy today.

I am nearing the finishing of my book, just a few more strokes, and a huge vacuum is opening up in my days and I need to shift gears, which is always a difficult thing, since inertia keeps one going in the same direction, stuck in a groove, sometimes an abyss. It is the hardest thing to change gears because we are creatures of habit, which, in the best of times, is a good thing for it gives structure to our days, and structure is security and productivity. But often it becomes necessary, perhaps essential, to change directions. When writing is your whole life and you have been doing if for a long stretch, to be left without it leaves you wheeling about directionless in space. It depresses me, makes me fall sick, and I know that it can also kill me.

So, shopping, preceded by that other wise I mentioned of which I may perhaps speak later, has put it in a wonderful space. My other life has opened up. When I am in a writing phase -- which is most of the time -- I wear the same clothes over and over again, resent social activities and household chores, neglect the garden. Now all the latter things have begun to bloom. I am wearing new clothes this morning, we are going to a new place to walk today, and there is a general newness in the air. NEWNESS. My body and brain become hungry for it and I have to feed them this newness. Even in my walk yesterday I took new paths, wandered down allies never seen before, noticed trees suddenly visible in their blooming beauty. Unless we renew ourselves in spring like the earth, there is danger of falling into depression.