Categories: news-from-depressionland
Tags: Autumn, depression, balancing
Date: 11 September 2007 16:03:57
Maybe it's because I'm Jewish (Rosh Hashanah's in two days time, but I had to look that up) or maybe it's a legacy of arriving at university in a glorious blue and gold October, but it's always seemed to me that autumn is a much better time to start a new year than the grey misery of January (relieved only by my birthday) can ever be.
Today's a case in point: brilliant blue sky, low but intense Indian summer sun, and just enough crispness in the air to put a spring (or is that a fall?) in the step. Autumn's when the school year starts again after the slog of keeping a child entertained for the holidays, and when I turn from being a full time mum for six long weeks, and return to my other identity as a writer. It's also when I start to think again about getting a life, the ingredients of which are such joys as singing classes, writers' workshops, weekend retreats - all the things that don't happen while teachers are enjoying their much deserved break and temporarily transferring the load back to parents ((if you happen to be both, I guess you are just a hardier breed than I).
So here it all begins again, the 'you'll be amazed' circus act of balancing parenthood, church life, work, housewifery (when did I marry a house? I have no idea), and attempts at preserving - or should that be establishing? - sanity in the midst of it all. And believe it or not (and to change the metaphor), I actually love trying to keep taut all these various strings to my bow and somehow making music out of them all, even if it's only a distressed screeching. Which seems as good a place as any to launch into a blog that's about the fact that the alternative to black and white is not grey, but an infinite spectrum of extraordinary colours. Of which fact I need to remind myself often, since as a depressive, grey is too often my default. Today, however, is blue and gold...