Treading Water

Dear Lorenzo,

It's 11:26 p.m. and like most nights, insomnia has rendered me sleepless so right now I'm up, half-heartedly watching The Goldbergs (you would've liked it) and waiting for the melatonin to kick in.

Nighttime is still hard. Brutally fucking hard. I don't usually get lonely until night falls.

Normally I'm too busy to be lonely. And even if I'm not busy, I find ways to occupy my time, to fake having a life, to ignore the nagging emptiness that sometimes threatens to pull me under. But at nighttime, when Amira's asleep, before the melatonin or Tylenol PM knocks me out...it's hard to pretend I'm not alone.

But, two years, three months, and five days since you've been gone, I'm beginning to see light at the end of the proverbial tunnel. Today was a rainy, dreary Wednesday and since Samaiya called me this morning and offered to take Amira to school, I had absolutely no reason to leave the house. Two years ago, I would have put on ESPN, curled up on the futon, and not gotten up again until it was time to pick up Amira and take her to theater but today...

Today, I got off of my ass and got to work.

I washed and twisted my hair, cleaned my house, warmed up on the trampoline for two minutes before working out on the elliptical for 45. I had a big salad for lunch and an apple for a snack. I didn't curl up in a ball and pretend the world didn't exist until my alarm went off at 2:00 p.m. I didn't eat my weight in potato chips or have a glass of wine (or two or three) with dinner in an effort to forget.

I didn't let depression win on a rainy, dreary Wednesday.

I didn't let depression pull me under.