July In Review

I'm not going to bury the lead with this one, this coronavirus shit is destroying me. I can't remember ever being this depressed in my life, even back when I was in college, and was so much more prone to depression than I am now, I didn't feel this terrible.

My wife asked me if I was depressed in a way that I needed to see somebody about it, and all I could say was I don't know, because I've never seen anyone about depression before, but I wonder. There is one of those hotlines at my work that I can call free of charge to talk with someone. I believe it's there because working in news is an inherently depressing thing where you get exposed to the worst parts of humanity and the cold unfeeling red-in-tooth-and-claw nature. I've always been charged to make sure that the nudity or worse; dead bodies, mangled bodies, bloated drowned corpses; don't make it on air. That kind of stuff can be hard to deal with after a while, and I think the hotline is there to help you if you're having issues like that. I wonder if I should at least try that hotline, even though my problems don't stem from those kinds of issues.

In May of 2019, I started into a regiment of healthy eating, and I was able to take control of my health better than any other time in my life. Diabetes went away. Fat melted off. Energy returned. Self-confidence appeared. I was doing so good, and loved myself in a way that I hadn't since before the Standard American Diet dragged me down into its pit of despair. I lost 75 pounds, and was doing pretty well when I went to Utah for my dad's funeral and I took this picture with Rish Outfield:

Since that day, Rish has become very fitness and health oriented, and I have fallen back down that pit of despair. When we went on the trip to my dad's funeral, I gave myself permission to eat things I normally wouldn't and to drink soda that I normally wouldn't. Ostensibly, it was to help myself stay awake on our very, very long drive, but it opened the door to a tailspin that I am still fighting to overcome. I don't look that skinny anymore.

Eating the Standard American Diet has been found to cause a lot of depression and anxiety. So, giving into that was step one on my way to depression. I probably could have managed, however, if that was all that happened, but as you all know, in February and March, the world changed considerably.

Maybe it doesn't bother you, but it bothers me a great deal. This coronavirus thing has changed everything about life, and it's certainly not done either. The question that's always on my mind is will it ever come back? Will things go back to normal? Or will we be living for the rest of our lives in the world described by the phrase I keep hearing on TV, podcasts, and YouTube videos day in and day out "The New Normal"?

It's an Orwellian phrase for an increasingly Orwellian world that we live in. It feels like we're all on a runaway train headed straight toward a canyon where the bridge is out. That's one more thing that depresses the hell out of me. I was thinking the other day about those "In Memorium" segments they do on the Oscars each year, and it occurred to me that the people in this past February's ceremony were the lucky ones. They got to live up to the brink, but didn't have to experience the slide down to oblivion that the rest of us are riding on.

Will things go back to normal? I don't have any faith that they will. I'm afraid that the New Normal is here to stay. Why else would they use the goddamn phrase so fucking often if they didn't want us to internalize it, and get used to the idea?

Sad thing is, just typing these words has probably made at least half of the people reading this post...which is probably about two people, so one of them...to click off. We can't even discuss things anymore. Say the wrong word, and you're discovered as a heretic to one side or the other, and banished to roam the desert on your own. Or in my case to roam the dessert on my own.

This division is another thing driving my depression. It's everywhere. It's baked into every relationship that I have. There's no one I can talk to without possibly stepping on a land mine. Not the Dunesteef fans on Facebook or Twitter. Not my co-workers. Not my brothers and sisters. Not Rish. Not even my wife. There is no place in the world that I can just say what I'm thinking without fear. That alone is enough to make me think a long walk off a short bridge would be preferable.

I can't escape the division either. I made the stupid decision to get into the news business twenty years ago, mostly because it was the only steady job I could find that utilized the few skills that I had garnered in my time at college pursuing an absolutely worthless film degree. The news is this division stuff on a 24/7 loop. That's all we talk about. I have to bathe in it for 40 hours of every single week if I want to be able to pay my bills.

Now there's at least one bright side. I do have a job still, and so does my wife. It could be worse. Imagine how much more depressed I'd be if I was out of work and waiting on various charities and government programs to come through for me before the bank foreclosed on us and we were out on the street. I suppose that's why I'm still around to write this whiny post about being depressed.

My wife, in fact, got a promotion in the middle of all of this. She moved up to a higher job with substantially more responsibility. That, of course, means that she is spending tons more time at work these days, and she was already working too many hours before her promotion. So, I basically never see her. That surely adds to the dog-pile that's causing the depression. She's even been working most weekends, so we're almost strangers at this point.

Okay, okay, I could probably go on, but I'm not going to. I'm here to report on July and talk about what my goals are for August. So, let's see if we can manage to get to that before August is over, because it almost is already.

The one thing that is still going right is the writing. I may have fallen off the wagon, and gone back to eating all of the garbage that is systematically killing me softly, but there’s less temptation to quit writing. I’m not hopelessly addicted to not writing like I am hopelessly addicted to eating carbs. It’s super hard to look at everyone around me mindlessly eating the foods that I cannot control myself around, but there’s no correlation when it comes to writing. I don’t look at people not writing and think, “Oh man, I really want to not write too.” It’s just not a problem, so I have managed to stick with it so far. Here’s my chart for this month:

I do get a little bit of encouragement to quit from Rish’s daily posts about how he wants to quit, but so far, he hasn’t, so maybe that helps keep me on the straight and narrow. I have a much less gung ho attitude about the whole thing than I had in months past, and I suppose it shows in some of the daily totals I mustered this month.

In February and March I made it to 1,000 words every single day. In April, May, and June, I only had one slip-up in each month where I didn’t hit the 1,000 mark. July was different. Six different times I didn’t hit 1,000. I just didn’t care as much. If there were any issues that prevented me from finishing up my 1,000 words, then I just blew it off instead of finding a way around it like I had in months past.

I had several really good days as well, however, including 2,364 words on July 13th (Harrison Ford’s Birthday) a record for this whole year for me, and those helped to make up for my shortfalls on the other days. In fact, the 2,364 word day wiped out all my shortfall days except one...at least, I think so. Math isn’t really my strong suit. But the point is, it wasn’t a big deal at all. And it allowed me to be more relaxed about the whole thing. Rolling with the issues that arise because my family is always home thanks to this damn Covid shit. If I had been uptight about it, this month probably would have been much worse for me.

The funny thing is that I did better in July than I did in June. June was the first month since I began all of this that I didn’t beat the previous month’s total. May was 37,710 but June was only 33,458. That isn’t much of a shortfall, but it was less than the month before. In July, however, I got 34, 657. That’s a difference of 1,199. I suppose that could be accounted for by the fact that July has 31 days and June only 30, but I don’t care. I’m going to count it as a positive.

Now, this is one of the biggest positives of the whole thing. Here is my yearly total so far:

And here is the full chart showing the daily totals that lead up to the yearly total:

I am now slightly less than 30,000 words away from my goal of getting 300,000 words this year. There’s 31 days in August just like there is in July. So, as long as I get my 1,000 words a day, or even manage to average 1,000 words, I’ll make my goal before the month is out. That’s pretty exciting. I have all the way until my birthday to get to the goal, but I’m going to get there long before that. There’s something I can look forward to. Something positive that might be able to put a different trajectory on my emotional downward spiral.

I remember the feeling I had when I finished writing my first novel. It felt really good. I waked around the whole rest of the night buzzing a little bit about it, thinking, “I just wrote a novel. A whole novel. Amazing.” I’m not used to succeeding, so it’s pretty neat when it happens.

I can’t rely on the quest for 300,000 to pull me out of the tailspin, however. I decided that August was going to be my month. I was going to really kick some names and take some ass...or however that phrase goes. I made some goals for the month to turn things around, and I’m going to list them here so that I become responsible for them.

Goal #1: Write 30,000 words this month. This one goes without saying at this point, but I’m going to say it anyway.

Goal #2: Finish off THE GAUNTLET this month. I am heading into the finale of the book right now. It’s at 110,000 words right now, and will definitely not reach 30,000 more than that. Finishing both a novel and reaching my year’s goal in the same month should mean that I’ll feel doubleplusgood this month. I want to make that the new normal for me (that folks, is a callback).

Goal #3: Eat a Zero-Carb Diet this month. I’ve struggled with this for a while, and meant to take it by the throat the minute we crossed into August. It’s already the 5th today, though, and I still haven’t made it a complete day yet. Since March, I’ve gained 65 of the 75 pounds I’d lost back, and I’ve done untold damage to my body. Diabetics have famous health problems, including blindness, amputations, and kidney disease. I’ve got to get this under control before I screw my body up permanently. So, tomorrow, I’m going to make it happen, and then move forward from there. 26 days left in August. 26 days of Zero-Carb is what I’m shooting for. I have been thinking that I might have to go back to putting out Big Anklevich on Health videos to motivate myself to keep at it. If I do, however, they will be vastly simplified, and will get no editing at all.

Goal #4: Incorporate Rish’s Exercise Regimen Stuff 1. My daughter and I have been (inconsistently) working out together in the garage over the past few months. During July, however, I don’t think we went out there one single time. If we work out three times a week, there are 12 more days this month that we should hit. So, that’s my goal for the month. 12 days of working out.

Goal #5: Incorporate Rish’s Exercise Regimen Stuff 2. Rish does this sit-up goal for every day/for the month. He’s trying to do at least 100 sit-ups each day. He tells me that he does the running and the sit-ups as a way to boost his endorphins and stave off depression himself. I’ve listened to a few doctors talking about beating carb addiction. People like me often use carbohydrates as their emotional management tool. When they have problems, a bad day, a setback, or some other issue, they grab a box of donuts and stuff their face to feel that endorphin rush and feel better. The doctors suggest finding other things to get those endorphins. So, I’m going to try to get in the habit of doing exercises when I feel down in the dumps and tempted to eat carbs. I’ll do squats, or push-ups, or sit-ups or planks. I’ll even do them if I don’t feel depressed and tempted. The goal will be 50 squats a day, 50 pushups, 50 sit-ups and two minutes of planks. I think I can manage that. We’ll see. Altogether that should equal 1300 squats, push-ups and sit-ups, and 52 minutes of planks. I should look into other isometric exercises that I can do anywhere to add to the list of pick-me-ups for next month.

Goal #6: Stay away from social media of all types. If the division that fills everything upsets me, I can limit my exposure to it. So, no Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, or YouTube for me this month. I’ll probably post a thing or two there; not my political opinions, however, just links to blog posts and the like; but I will not be reading or watching anything there. If you want to ask me about something, you may need to just email me instead. Unfortunately for my sanity, I can’t limit my exposure to work, so hopefully the social media avoidance will be enough.

There you have it. That’s the deal for July and the upcoming deal for August. Will it work out for me? Yo, I don’t know. However, like that ant that wants to move the rubber tree plant, I’ve got high hopes--high, apple pie, in the sky hopes. Let’s roll.