The Depression vacation - Seratonin has never looked so good...

Why am I depressed? I don't know. And I swear to god, if you ask me if it's my "time of the month", I may just have to retire my moral standing on violence. I'll blame it on the depression.

I do know, however, that sometimes it's hard to know how to react when someone you know has  depression. Scenes like that can be illustrated by picturing the expression of the face of a man-beast presented with a crying woman/child. At least, that's always how I imagine it.

It wasn't clear, at first that there was a problem. I can't remember how it started; but I do remember the first time I realised something was wrong. I woke up one day and realised that, through a process of various excuses and good use of procrastination techniques, I had managed to miss an entire week of lectures and tuts. I can't even remember what I did that week. 

Depression is a strange beast. The symptoms are so contrary that it can be excused as something else entirely - if you eat too much, or too little; if you sleep more than usual but wake up feeling tired, or suffer from insomnia; feeling fidgety/can't sit still, or else you move at a slower pace than usual. 

In my case, it's all the first ones, besides the last - fidgety, I am not. Once you know what the problem is, it is easier to deal with. I was ecstatic at the thought that the wet wool blanket constantly dragging me down wasn't just laziness. That the antisocial preference for the sticking my nose in a book, never to emerge; rather than the family friends over for dinner, wasn't the beginnings of agoraphobia. That I didn't have to worry as much about the conflicting feelings of the enjoyment of doing work for subjects such as Mandarin versus the tendency to mope around hating all the deadlines piling up around me like a cracked dam wall.

There was a huge sense of relief that took all the pressure off - it wasn't just me! This is all Seratonin's fault! Huzzah for antidepressants that made me feel like my organs were rattle-shaped and  in the hands of a very enthusiastic baby; but more importantly - that made me feel excited about things towards which I had previously only felt apathy.

There are two things I learnt very quickly, however:

1. Medication can only do so much
2. Food can only do so much 

I haven't really paid much attention to no. 2 though - I'm pretty sure I should now be a major stockholder in Nandos, Lays, Coca-Cola and any company that is selling chocolate products.

My social life is still a mess. I'm sorting out my university work, although it feels a lot like chasing dropped R200 note flailing around in the wind evading capture. My res room is STILL a mess, complete with unpacked boxes, an unmade bed, unknown amounts of takeaway-container debris, shoes and clothes. I still feel like a failure 5 days out of 7 - and the other two days are kinda hazy so I'm not too sure about those. I still feel the need to sleep until 10 (13:00 is my record). I still eat enough to feed a large, over-populated country. I still fall into slumps where I feel hopeless and resigned. I still cling to ridiculously stupid things that only serve to clutter up my life and my room. I still berate my traitorous body and mind for being so weak - for not fighting harder. I still don't know how to fix all the damage I've done to my life and those in it.

Every now and then, I wake up and the sky is overcast; everyone I meet coming down the stairs is hungover; Jacob Zuma did something dumb and the dininghall has run out of Bovril. Sometimes these are the days when I'll wake up feeling like I just had a vitamin B injected into my butt. These are the days where I do all my assignments in a couple of hours. The days when I wake up at 8am feeling refreshed. The days I love everything about myself. The days when I can sit on my window sill and stare at the view for hours in awe of the sky. Whatever the cause, these are the days that save me.

Because I sound like I swallowed five self-help books, I'm going to end off with a link to someone who expressed her depression in a far more satisfying way:
Hyperbole and a Half - Adventures in depression

A quick note (30/09/2012):
I'm far from being an expert - medical or otherwise - on depression; but I do know what it feels like, obviously. If you or a friend are going through this too, feel free to comment below, I'm really interested to know how others handle it...

I try really hard to be cool. Emphasis on the 'try'

Okay, so along with the hipster influence virus (yes, I do realise that spells HIV - how naughty of me) going around these days, I'm feeling way too much pressure. Peer pressure - the social STD. All the faux *cough lenseless* ray bans, the expensive, strategically torn jeans and the too large tank tops showing off that little hint of bra. Okay, I'm sounding spiteful, that's just my jealousy talking - all I wanna do is be one of the cool kids.

I'm not fashionable though - at best I'm a copy-cat. I like to think it's because I'm too much of an Everyman. Quick aside: If you don't know to what I'm referring when I say 'Everyman', go get some culture you heathen beast. <---see peer pressure, I just gotcha!

Getting back on track though. I feel like I have to try hard to be cool. And random. It honestly doesn't come naturally - I bet you didn't know that one. Being completely random in an ironic yet funny way is really hard, and I do try, but it's just sooooo much work damnit. The self-deprecating though, now that's a big ball of fun.

See...Even in this blog post, all I've done is be random about being random to get your attention and make you like me. Dear God please like me. You know all I want is your approval. And a couple hundred Facebook likes. And money. Actually, just money - you can just give me lots of money.

I was going to go about the attention-seeking another way though. I used to daydream about being an actress. I even took Drama to Matric. Then I realised how much effort it takes to be a 'Thespian' rather than merely just an uncultured fool in tights on a stage. I got over the effort. Definitely did not get over being the centre (okay FINE, slightly off-off centre) of attention.

I also got over the admin of sticking - and excelling in - one sport or hobby. In my long illustrious life, I have participated in no less than 50. This includes (but is not restricted to) hockey, diving, gymnastics, ballet, tapdancing, kickboxing, athletics, chess (dear GOD I was bad at that) art (now THAT I kick ass at) and many many more.

These days, I just give in and realise that my talents lie elsewhere. Namely watching my flavour-of-the-week series, eat constantly student-style (i.e. lots of fat, carbs and general crap), pick up some uni work, put it down again, and finally after a long internal debate ending in a resounding "Screw it" - order Nandos.

So basically I've just wasted 10 minutes (depending on your reading speed - you should really work on that) of your life that you will NEVER get back telling you that I'm uncool, unmotivated, uncomplicated, undedicated (I just made that a word, shut up) and lazy. Whatta day for revelations. You must be so proud Mom.

Love and peace my oh-so-(sometimes)-faithful peeps.
Comment on this post or die. I've been watching horrors this month so I have new torture techniques!
Okayluvyabyeeeee!

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Today This Girl dies Hurtling Through the Past

On Thursday afternoon we were given a Journalism assignment - a personal narrative of 500-700 words about a defining moment in your life. Now, I culd talking about myself all day, and I do - regularly. This task, however, required more than just talking about who my favourite Jonas brother is (which I'm taking to my grave). Defining moments don't just pop by every day, sometimes you have to think about it a bit, others knew as soon as they heard the topic. One of the girls in my res, Abbey, wanted to write about her brother, but found it to be too painful. If you're curious by what I mean about that last one, well, you'll have to ask her yourself - it's not my story to tell, and I wouldn't do it justice anyway.

So, here's mine, Claire says it's pretty good and although I know I could have written it a little better I'm posting it up here for keepsakes, enjoy! :)

Nothing Special

I don’t want to do this. I really REALLY don’t want to do this. Change the double nappies of a 35 year old, non-verbal, Richard Harris; grab my shower gel from sticky-fingered Chris Salierno; calm another one wearing a hole in the floor on the other side of the cabin  – ‘No Charlie, they weren’t shouting at you’; reassuring John that yes, I will be watching you at the talent show tonight; switch Richard Blasco’s shoes around; help Josh pull his pants up; fetch Charlie as he wanders outside; eye a suspiciously gleeful Chris S; thank Cliff for the hug, struggle to get out of it; promise John that he can listen to his Hannah Montana CDs later; No Richard C, you can’t have ‘cawfee’ right this very second, we’ll get you some at breakfast; dodge Cliff’s hug/headlock; rescue my shower gel yet again as it’s cornered by Chris S and herd them all off to breakfast. That takes care of 15 minutes in the 20 hour day-shift. I really, really REALLY don’t want to do this. That was my mantra, and I was sticking to it.

We worked 20 hours a day, 6 days a week constantly supervising, changing nappies, feeding, toileting, showering and coaxing campers to daily activities. We were running on sugar, Gatorade and pure adrenaline. Every night we’d have 3 hours off from 9-12, and so every night found all the counsellors face-planted on the various couches in the staff cabin or playing pool. The highlight, though, was everyone huddled around the TV and trading war-stories of the day; because even if I had woken up to see Natalie standing on her bed, all the sheets completely stripped and thrown off the edge, brown smeared all over her hands, face, legs and bed waiting to be cleaned up by yours truly – there was always someone with a story worse than mine.

Third session was when I first worked with men that summer and even while I was screaming inside as I tried to maintain a calm, soothing front; for the first time in 4 weeks I was loving every second of it. Richard C repeatedly asked for ‘cawfee’ all day long, Josh listened to Harry Potter audio tapes while walking around the cabin and waving his hands around, John blasted ‘I lay my Love on You’ and ‘Best of Both Worlds’ until we begged him to stop and Cliff was 6 foot tall with no front teeth and loved giving hugs with alarming regularity and strength. Then there was Chris Salierno, the exception to every rule. The easiest way to describe him is to imagine what people would be like if we gave in to every impulse we ever had. If Chris Salierno wants to shave his eyebrows off, that’s what he’ll do. If Chris Salierno wants to be Camp Director, well then we make business cards and he becomes ‘my boss’.

For Chris Salierno, nothing is impossible.

Doing something you were set against from the start has fairly obvious issues, and while many of us dreamt of jumping ship and running home to mommy, being in a whole other country made it rather difficult. That and the fact that quitting is never easy, especially when there is an expectation that you will. So I stayed at the special needs camp in Effort, Pennsylvania for 9 weeks being continually driven to the brink of madness and back again. It was exhausting, but our motley group of about 60 people from various countries all trudged through the carnage that was summer camp.

It was a rather fun experience.

Today This Girl Dies of Boredom

So yesterday woke me up at 7:00am with a grunt, a snore (charming, I know) and the charming tones of BBGrooves - Interlude, a tune to which Blackberry assumes  people want to wake up. That aside, I stumbled to my feet and was somehow dressed, ready and out the door by 7:30am for my Chinese lecture at 7:45. 7:40am found me outside the door of the Geog10 classroom staring blankly at it's apparent emptiness. Chinese was at 9:35am. Computer Science was at 7:45.

It was one of those mornings.

The carnage even had the nerve to continue throughout the day - my comp sci lecturer thinks he's the coolest thing since sliced bread, I nearly fell down the stairs and the University carnival that night was a complete flop - if not for anyone else, then just me I guess... It was alright though, I had a bit of a zombie-zone-out thing going on all day, so it was all just vaguely amusing tinged with the sense that I was missing something. I did get to watch Easy A again though with one of the girls in my res, Claire, and it was as awesome as ever.:)

So aside from all my foolishness of yesterday, I'm fine, how are you? Or should I say, 'Wo hen hao Ni ne?' Chinese is probably on of the coolest things ever, despite the fact that to say some of the words in the necessary tones, some seriously weird facial expressions are required...

For all those wondering by now why I'm actually writing this blog in the first place - I'm not a celebrity (*gasp*or am I?) - the answer is predictably simple (I'm not generally a very deep person) - I have to. For Journalism 1, at some point, we have to do something like blogging, or so I'm told. So I am gracing you all with my writing presence just to get the hang of the whole thing, not being a big writer in the first place. And I just like writing about myself. That's the only reason really... And I could write about the multitudes of celebrities that have no effect on my life whatsoever (alright fine, maybe they do, just a little), a year-long project that I'll never finish or a subject that I know absolutely nothing about, but have an opinion on anyway but I like talking about myself so that's all been done to death anyway...

Enough about me though, how are you? Did you watch <Insert generic-popular-series-of-the moment here> last night? Please, do feel free to comment in the box below, I know now what all those blog writers are going through when they keep asking for comments, it feels a bit weird to just be randomly writing stuff and sending it off into the great World Wide Web...

I'll leave you with another quote today, this one again from Easy A:

"We've had nine classes together since Kindergarten... ten if you count Religion of Other Cultures, which you didn't because you called it science fiction and refused to go. "

Today This Girl dies from over-analysation

I've always found that starting something is one of the hardest things in the world (the many years that have seen me procrastinating right up until the last minute can attest to that) so you must understand that this first post is quite the achievement. Especially after all the niggling over the small details of the blog layout, colours, etc,etc,etc... Really unnecessary considering I'm supposed to be working.

So, getting down to business, this fantastic little blog exists for the sole purpose of chronicling the life and many indecisions of your truly. Who is 'yours truly'? I'm glad you asked, I've been dying to talk about me all along. Well, for starters there's a neat little fast run-through-answer of that very question at the top of this page; as for more, I'll start with the usual - my name is Kelly, yes I have Facebook, yes I have Twitter, yes I have BBM. Funny how those last three affirmations are all you really need to know - in fact you don't even need to carry on reading, you can just find out the rest of my name and proceed with the Facebook-stalking; which is why I shall henceforth forever be known as just - Kelly; unless my mother is reading this, in which case it doesn't matter coz she Face-stalks me anyway. Even though the single name, considering the success of Beyonce/Adele/Madonna/Rihanna, is actually a good thing, I'll probably end up giving the game away at some point. On the right is my Twitter feed, you're welcome to stalk me there along with all the other strange characters declaring themselves to be 'young, hot and ready for action', and because I have a little techno geek bounding around in my brain, there'll also be a few gadgets hanging around the page - Youtube videos, etc; and I'm definitely not giving out my BBM pin, that's just inviting disaster...

As for the rest of the basics, I could be an 80 year gap-toothed man with a good-sized paunch going on and you wouldn't know the difference if I told you otherwise, but I'll tell you that I'm an almost-twenty-something student doing a Bachelor of Journalism at a certain University in sunny South Africa anyway.

So, if I've managed to keep you mildly entertained for this long, then that can be my major achievement of the day (sad considering I had a long to-do list of important university related stuff) and I can sign off with a little quote from the movie I'm currently hooked on, and which fits the current weather and mood in general of my little sphere of consciousness because 'I've gotta pocket, got a pocket full of sunshine; I've got a love and it's all mine, oh, uwooo...'.

Yes I did just quote Natasha Beddingfield, but it's from Easy A so that makes it okay - feel free to sing long.