Human

This morning I spent a couple of hours trying to convince myself to go railfanning.

I failed.

It was Monday on the Canadian Thanksgiving long weekend. Everyone was sleeping in, except for me. I was awake because I hardly ever sleep in.

I saw a lovely sunrise from my living room window.

“Wouldn’t that look great with a train in front of it?”

“You know you’ll love it once you’re out there.”

“The light is really nice right now. It’d be nice to be out trackside, feeling that sun and waiting for a train.”

I. Just. Couldn’t. Do. It.

Instead, I puttered around the house for a bit, then I went for a walk in our subdivision.

While I was walking, I was berating myself for wasting this lovely morning. I felt more and more sad at missing this opportunity to make some good photographs. I was missing out.

At the same time, I was telling myself how absolutely stupid this was, feeling sad about not taking train pictures. Of all the things to be sad about, this was pretty trivial.

That’s one way that I experience depression.

Sadness or anger for no good reason… with an awareness that it’s not a “normal” emotion to be feeling.

I knew that going railfanning wasn’t important. I also knew that I would have enjoyed once I went out. I knew that how I spent my morning wasn’t really important.

Still, that self doubt, that disappointment in myself, it comes around.

I used to keep a diary when I was a teenager. I have a couple of little notebooks hanging around, along with some computer entries.

I used to re-read my entries several days or weeks after I made them, and add little notes in the margins. Usually these notes were self-critical – downright vicious, in fact. I was so hard on myself.

These days, I try to give myself more grace, more room to not be perfect.

We have to be kind to ourselves.

As that 80s song by The Human League said, “I’m only human / Of flesh and blood I’m made / Human / Born to make mistakes”.

When I returned from my walk, I saw this little artificial rainbow on our living room floor.

I’ll take it.