Labour Day Sucks, and the Simple Pleasure of Keeping Depression at Bay

During the summer, I got into a routine of making videos and writing. I was having fun, and getting my stuff out there on the regular.

Then September rolled in and the boys went back to school and wow, did this year’s Labour Day knock me for a loop.

I’ve never particularly liked Labour Day.

As a kid, I never hated going back to school, I was good at it, and my friends were there. Then, in university, work ended and the BYOB party began. But, Labour Day itself was a celebration of union myths and bullshit, which rather grate on my nerves.

Nowadays things are much worse.

Labour Day signifies the end of my boys being around all day, and me losing them to the schools, and to their friends. Every summer is one fewer I get to spend with them, and with my oldest being 15, I’m running out of summers with him.

Thus, this year, Labour Day dropped me into a pit of depression, one of the worst I’ve ever experienced.

It took three months to get out, and it was only getting ready for Christmas, and the joy and magic it brings to little boys, that extracted me.

Now we’ve ticked over a new year, and I’m back to daily writing (videos come next), and I’ve discovered (again) that I take pleasure and satisfaction from these actions: doing them aid in my escape from the latest depressive episode.

There’s a lesson in there for me, and some day I’m going to learn it. Your hobbies, and a sense of accomplishment from achievements in them, are a mood lifter.

If I hadn’t stopped, well, everything, but specifically my content creation and publishing, I probably would not have been as deeply depressed, not for as long.

Finding some way to keep Ol’ Demon Depression from taking away your simple pleasures helps you keep Ol’ Demon Depression from taking you.