Legendary Pink Nots, or A Day In The Life Of The Deviant Hiker, sans Hiking or Deviance

Yesterday started out normally enough. I woke up feeling depressed and wanting to get back under the covers. But I have to eat and stuff, so I need my job. I dutifully got up, shuffled to the bathroom, brushed my teeth, took the meds that are supposed to make it all better, and got in the shower. Dressed. Made coffee. Sat down for the morning pre-work ritual: Toasted bagel and yogurt. Open the laptop to see if I've heard anything from the only person I really want to hear anything from every morning (I hadn't).

Still, I left the house feeling better as the meds kicked in, but not as better as normal, which is usually a bad sign. I tried to shrug it off and reminded myself that tonight I was going to see the Legendary Pink Dots perform, and I was very excited about it. I actually finished work early, and went home to take advantage of the time by sleeping a little, knowing I'd not be getting home till the wee hours of the morning and having to work the next day as usual. At 5 I picked up my son and took him home, where we played video games until it was time to drop him off at his mother's at 6, she having agreed to take him early so I could go to the show.

Driving back to my apartment, in order to catch the 6:30 train into the city, I started to feel down again. Anxious. Thinking about what time I'd arrive at the venue, worried I'd be late. Started to think about people staring at me as I walked in late to the gig. Ridiculous, I know, and I knew it as I was thinking it, too. Welcome to my world. I did my best to shrug it off. I parked, ran inside, grabbed my camera and headed down the street to the train station. I boarded the waiting train and took a seat, where I sat and felt the anxiety start to come up again. Suddenly, all I wanted was to be home with a cup of coffee and a book on my couch. I couldn't stand the idea of seeing people tonight, much less strangers who might look at me disapprovingly. I thought about how pathetic it made me feel to be going alone. The next thing I knew, I was off the train and walking home as it pulled out of the station. No gig for me tonight.

So now I've missed the show, and of course I bitterly regret not going. I've heard nothing but rave reviews from people across the country for this tour, and having seen them myself twice before, I don't doubt it. I know friends will be asking me how the show was, so to avoid having to tell it over and over again, I thought I'd just embarrass myself once for all to see. It may be time to make an appointment with my shrink to discuss this incident. This isn't the first time something like this has happened, but it's never happened before with something I so badly wanted to see. Hooray for progress.