Depression 2009

As I sit here, sipping my 50-cent coffee, watching folks hard at work cleaning-up after the 2nd Snowpocalypse, it dawns on me.

There is no Christmas music playing. And those workers aren’t simply pressure washing the excess sand, but removing Christmas lights.

The holiday season is over.

Let the depression begin.

While Christmas shopping tends to bring-out the worst in people, the season on-the-whole seems to bring out the humanity in folks. Families get-together, friends have parties, employers give out yearly bonuses and even in these tough economic times charities see an influx of donations.

It’s freaking beautiful.

I am a Christmas freak. I love the music, I love the food, I love the parties. Simply put, I love the love.

And now it’s over. (A tear.)

I always get pretty bummed-out around this time of year. *And not just because I got to spend Christmas Even and New Year’s Eve all-by-my-lonesome, as I did this year.

It’s a lot like a 5 year-old who binges on a ton of candy, I love the high and hate the inevitable crash.

So nearly a week into the New Year, I am in a sour mood.

This is the week when folks really begin to see what resolutions are going to stick and which aren’t. I am failing miserably on mine. This is where the hope raised in a drunken stupor begins to come back down to reality.

Reality sucks.

I think that is the beauty of the Holidays and New Years, you get to suspend reality for a bit. Kids dream of the perfect present and adults look to the New Year hoping for a change after a year that may not have progressed as they liked.

But sadly, the excesses that are excused by “Oh, it’s the holidays,” reasoning must be reigned-in as folks buckle-down for the coming year.

Maybe we are all just that gluttonous 5 year-old at heart. I know I am.

Guess the trick is to find that balance.

But with the New Year comes a reminder that change is coming and though it seems all but forgotten now, sunny weather is on the way.

Something tells me that the first time I hit a tennis ball over the net, I’ll have long-forgotten this sad sack-dom that befalls me annually.

But until then, I need some candy.