My last post was about three weeks ago. A combination of depression and anxiety sidelined me starting the first week of August. Talking to other writers and arts-based workers, there seemed to have been a rash of depressive episodes during this month.

I’ve always had anxiety–it’s my daily not-so-best buddy. GAD, to be more exact. I’ve probably always had some level of depression, too. Comes from having that kind of middle-class background with the dark underbelly. You think you move past these things, but really you just learn how to cover them up, adapt, work through them, to the point where you don’t even recognize them any more.

I’m past the depression now, though the anxiety is still making it difficult to write. Some part of me has to wonder if August is always going to be a trigger for me, it being the month I had to send my husband away to someone else for a course of experimental chemo. And then the three weeks after he came home, with all the uproar, almost no sleep, and being powerless to fix anything for him as he slowly faded away. I have diagnosed PTSD from that, which is slowly fading as I paint new memories over the old.

But enough about that. What’s been going on in Kitty’s world since the beginning of August? Or, more accurately, this past week, since no one wants to hear about me binge-playing Tera and watching the entire first season of Mad Men in one day.

I have two writing announcements to make in the near future. I’ve got an outline for the sequel to Bite Me Tender, in which I put Glyn through the wringer again. World Weaver Press is looking for short stories about sirens, which I happen to have an idea kicking around for. I have a new keyboard that lights up when I even wave my hand above it. And I think the guy I just bought a heat pump from was flirting with me. I’m not sure, it’s been a while. 😛 But he has a boat. And a Cadillac. And a sense of humour. And I think I’m much shallower than I ever realized.

So, if August was the darkest it’s ever going to be–and I can’t see how it could get much darker than it was, given some of my thoughts during those weeks–things aren’t doing too badly. I don’t expect a steady climb out of the pit, but I think maybe this will be the year I can pull the stops out and see what I can make of this writing thing.

All Aboard the Wordy-Word Express!