I'm Cranky AND Blessed. I Just Thought You Should Know.

I'm feeling kind of cranky, but I'm also in the mood to write, so here I am both being cranky and writing.

Aren't you lucky you stopped by?

I am feeling all foot stompy, because haven't been in the mood to do anything over the last week or two. I want to just put everything down and go on an extended vacation where I just sit somewhere warm and maybe go for a few walks but feel absolutely no obligation to take in culture or learn anything new or accomplish a single task. I want to wave a big old middle finger at anyone who would even say hello to me, because that hello comes with an expectation that I will say hello, and even that amount of obligation feels like you're rubbing my fur backwards.

I'm irritable.

While I'm irritable tonight, though, I haven't been irritable 100% of the time lately, and I've been thinking about how I have been writing all of this serious material about my newish sobriety and the kid-free kerfuffle thing and anxiety and seasonal depression, and I haven't been writing about how freaking excellent so much of my life is.

I write about how hard sobriety is, but I haven't talked at length about how much I feel like embracing my sober life and cover it in slobbery dog kisses, because I like more things and enjoy people more and remember the things I've done and don't feel hungover all the time that I'm not drunk.

I went on about how horrible some people can be to those of us kid-free types with their assumptions about everyone wanting and needing children, but I didn't talk about all of the wonderful people who stood up and said Me, too and thanked me for creating a space for them and shared their experiences and offered their support.

I talked about how I suffer from anxiety and have some bandaid ways for dealing with the panic that it can bring on, but I didn't talk about the real gift of which anxiety is a side effect, which is a heightened sensitivity to my environment and the people in it that allows me to experience and take in my environment at a level that lends to my deepening understanding of myself and the world around me and absolutely founds my creativity.

I can't think of something awesome about seasonal depression. Depression as a seasonal affliction can suck it.

I have stumbled and fumbled my way into a life that allows me to eat and sleep regularly under a roof of my choosing with a life partner of my choosing in a culture that doesn't outrightly count me as chattel, and beyond that I have the great fortune of seeking others of my kind and creating art and words and communities through an incredible set of technologies that I never dreamed possible as an isolated child.

I really do feel this fantastic sense of being blessed somehow, of having fallen into an incredible pocket filled with chance and good luck, especially now that I am sober enough to see it all.

By all of the above, I mean to say that MY LIFE IS GOOD. I just forget to talk about how my life is good, because once I explain all the dark stuff to myself here on the internet, I tend to go out into the world or eat good food or have a nice nap and feel good about stuff, because I worked it out here.

And, by all of the above, I also mean to say that I WANT TO WRITE ABOUT THE GOOD STUFF MORE OFTEN, because there is a lot of good stuff, and it's worth writing down.

So, I may be cranky lately, but I am also blessed and happy, and I think it's worthwhile to make some noise about both sides of the coin.

And you? How's your crankiness? Well-tainted with the happy, I hope.