For Indigo

It seems strange that we lie here together, wrapped in blankets and sound,
me reading, you dozing,
watching me with those patient brown eyes half-sleepy half-adoring.
Your head is resting on my hip,
your paws jutting into my legs as you insist on taking up two-thirds of the sofa,
lying along side me.
You have inspected the book I'm reading,
decided that it's not worth chewing, as you prefer textbooks or schoolbooks or secondhand romance novels.
Either that, or you approve of Neil Gaiman (but don't like a-level drama texts).
As I type, you've rested your head on my legs, causing pins and needles to invade my feet,
but move when prodded, groaning and sighing as though I've asked you to perform some impossible feat.
It seems strange that we've been together for nearly nine months now,
at once the time has gone quickly, but I can't imagine not having you at my side, underfoot, stealing my clothes or waking me in the middle of the night by kicking me in the face as you did last night.
You're my good dog.

drunken butterfly

I miss him
I love him.
These two thoughts are constant in my mind, part reassuring, part worrying, always hovering near the surface.
Sometimes, it scares me.
How strongly I feel about another person.
I've been in love before.
At least, at the time, I thought myself in love.
But perhaps, loving him as I do now, perhaps I wasn't as in love as I thought, but only in love with the idea of being in love.
I know I want him near me, beside me.
Not far away, on the other side of the ocean, but close, in the next room or down the road or in my bed.
In my heart.
I want to share what I have with him.
To be there when he's tired, angry, hungry.
To laugh, fight, love and cry.
The phone helps, he's not so far away when he's on the other end.
But still not close enough to reach out and touch, although if I close my eyes, I can feel his arms around me.

everyone fucks up it's going to be ok

This is the worst thing about depression. Knowing I'm getting depressed, as though I'm watching from the sidelines inside my own head, listening to this little part of myself shouting, screaming "no, don't go there, step back" even though I know that I'm only shouting to myself, and the rest of me isn't listening or can't hear or doesn't care, but is blithely steaming into the darkness.

I know stress is a trigger. I know. And I can control my own stress, to some degree. Take regular breaks, walk away from revision, cuddle the dog, stroke a bunny, take a nap. What I can't control is other people's stress. While I can walk away from or block out a stranger's stress - to a certain degree, although it's damn near impossible in uni - I can't do the same to my friends. I can't say "I'm sorry, your panicing about your exams is making me panic, and I'm not really interested in becoming suicidal right now, thx bye" to the people who matter to me, who support me in turn. I can't tell my friends that thier own petty dramas are impacting on my petty dramas - because to them, thier dramas aren't petty, just as mine aren't to me. And because I don't want to lose a dearest, oldest friend because she's getting worked up over an exam, or she's broken up with her boyfriend, or because she is going through what I went through, and is asking for help a lot quicker than I ever did.

I don't want to be heard-hearted or cruel. I want to support them, as they do me, because I can support them now. I can listen, I can sympathise, I can provide wine and chocolate and loud music and a comfy sofa and a listening ear. But will they do the same for me, when thier exams are over, they're done, and mine are just beginning? Will they grow tired of my moaning, my bitching, as often as I do thiers?

Part of me knows there is a single difference between me and them: they are doing thier courses because they want to - they don't know what they want to "be" once they leave university. I do. It's all I've wanted - and I am doing a course to reach that end. But with every year, the end gets jerked that bit further away, and I'm starting to fear I'll never reach that end. That no matter what I do I'll never be able to take that step to getting there.

Perhaps I ought to fight harder, work harder, stand taller, speak louder. That's what the little screaming voice is telling me. She's saying I can do it, I will do it, I'll do everything in my power to do it. But the rest of me isn't listening, she's too busy writing self-obsessive posts and moping over how inept, useless and thick she is.

Revision (part eleventy-billion)

I think I've reached that stage in revision. You know, that one. The plateau stage. I've gotten to the point where I sort-of know everything, vaguely. Most of it isn't in any great detail, and I couldn't tell you much unless I was under exam conditions (I do better with the adrenaline rush). But when I open my notes, I know it. When it's in front of me.

Consequently, I'm familiar with what I'm reading. I've already re-written it, made notes on it at least once. I've recorded it on tape. It's old news to me now. Every now and again, I come across something new (today... population genetics), but it's finding the new information in an ever-shrinking pool of available notes that gets harder every time. And consequently, there is a greater temptation to procrastinate.

The Boy Wonder has gone back to school, and the hound misses him. He got all worked up when the brother started getting his stuff together, hoping he was going for a walk (it's raining, and he won't want to go... but every time he gets excited) and now he's lurking in his bed, looking mournful. I enjoyed having BW over this weekend. He's good company, most of the time... when he wants to be.