Languishing

I needed to get out, escape My Space and the screen.  I've not felt particularly well.  Cheer seems to elude me, though there are pockets of reversal, usually when in conversation with somebody else, suggesting more loneliness than depression.  I've done a few changes of pace, getting away for the day, going out for coffee or breakfast or lunch.  Getting myself stuff, or even looking at stuff to purchase in a store on online does not change my perspective.  

Not that those changes of location are worthless.  They are not.  Just transient.  Doing something for myself does not seem to do very much.  I've devoted some effort to making My Space closer to what I had originally envisioned.  I ironed shirts.  I've made a few special dinners.  All things that now generate less pleasure than they once did.

Post-Holiday sales.  To Boscov's.  Second floor: stuff, none needed, none wanted, none discounted. First floor.  Clothing.  Some attractive button down shirts.  Maybe go back for one if I get invited someplace where I could wear it.   Then Marshall's.  Decent discounts, about 20%, and a fair amount of stuff referenced to St. Louis, if you count Budweiser as part of St. Louis.  There are things that I could use.  In fact, I replaced my broken safety razor.  But a 20% discount on something you don't particularly want does not alter loneliness.

My forum of engagement has recently been kiddush after shabbos services or having guests to my shabbos table.  But as the final weekend of the secular calendar approaches, I find myself shuled out, annoyed with a couple of key people, and approaching Jewed out but not quite arrived there yet.  Need a break from synagogue.  An offshoot of work burnout for me.

Electronic interaction with others has not gone especially well.  While Twitter is a public blight, it is a forum for me to convey what I think.  Responses are few, and it is the responses that ease loneliness.  FB is a little more personally interactive.  The Stanford alumni of their how to deceive people into thinking they are engaged when they really aren't understand the value of Likes.  Any kind of response is fine.  Reddit allows me to express what I think, and occasionally people write back.  But all these lack the spontaneity of banter at kiddush.

As I move into the new secular year, addressing what appears to be loneliness needs to be one of the twelve Semi-Annual projects.