Oh, I'm a good kind of tired.

I am exhausted. But I have this feeling of accomplishment that I a) stayed awake enough to pull off the blogathon and 2) BROKE THROUGH something in my mind, in my cognitive framework regarding my depression. I'm not saying I'll never get depressed again, but I am saying I now feel like I can use what tools I have a little more effectively.

I am seeing in my writing definite places where I am healing.

Wow, even writing that kind of takes my breath away. Those of you who know me (and there are probably waaaay more of you out there now that I have spilled my guts 50+ times in the last couple of days) know that I am NOT an optimist. I am a pessimist, a chronic complainer, and basically a misanthrope. So writing this is kind of groovy, in a pushes-way-against-my-comfort-zone kind of grooviness.

Today Tim and I gave Barb a ride back to Louisville to pick up her truck. After we met for lunch, we drove up to Louisville, Tim and Barb chatting away in the front seat as I sat in back with Tara, listening to my iPod. The soundtrack for the trip was Justin Timberlake (FutureSexLoveSounds), the Glen Miller Orchestra (In the Mood), and Me First and the Gimme Gimmes ("Somewhere Over the Rainbow" and "Tomorrow"). When we got there I realized that just by my musical selection I am a hopeless geek and freak. And then it dawned on me: I am okay with that. In fact, I am more than okay with that. The breakthrough I experienced (but sadly cannot put into words) is that I am okay with all my freakishness and my foibles. I will be forty this year. And they ain't going away. So it's either embrace who I am now, or spend the next forty years like the first: full of self-loathing and feeding the darkness.

And the other part of the breakthrough? The words are coming a bit easier now. I can see the light, and the channel is getting way better reception.

So off to sleep and hopefully not to dream. I am reading a British crime mystery novel (winner of the Crime Writer's Association Silver Dagger Award), Morag Joss' Half Broken Things. It is way creepy and I've had to suspend my disbelief a few times. It's not taking my breath away or leaving me in awe, but I am still reading it.