I Must Be Part Cat

I planned to take a short nap around 8:30 last night--and slept through until 4 AM. At that point, I set my alarms and turned out the lights--and started tossing and turning. Arrgh. I swear that I sleep better in the light. I must be part cat.

Well, that means that I can stop by a bunch of salons before work. (I work swing shift.) For that matter, I can go to the store because I didn't go last night.

I'm subscribed to several Younique groups on Facebook, and sometimes I get frustrated at the amount of posts on them. But they're giving me what I need. Yesterday, when I woke up too late to go to salons, I found that someone posted a picture saying "Don't give up." This morning, I found that my sponsor posted a video about how to approach salons. And I really like the products that I've tried, so I want to take this as far as I can take this.

So my plan is to watch the video, get my Younique materials organized, pull myself together, take some selfies (in the daylight!), go to the store, stop at the nail salon across from the store (there seems to be a nail salon at every strip mall in this town), drop stuff off, make my lunch, and go to nail salons on my way to work. (Harlee is telling me that "pet Harlee" should be on the list. She didn't get her fair share of petting last night.) Ready, set...go.

Robin Williams

The death of Robin Williams has really shaken me up for reasons I can’t entirely explain, although having battled clinical depression for the last year gives me an inkling of what he might have been going through. Bipolar depression is especially lethal; one in ten people with bipolar disorder wind up killing themselves. Not attempting suicide, which is a much higher rate (some studies say 50 percent), but killing themselves. And depression is no respecter of talent. In point of fact, the very talented set high standards for themselves, and not meeting those standards can be difficult to take. “Whom the Gods wish to destroy, they first call promising.”

And of course, he was an enormous talent, and a great loss.

Someone made a comment that, by all accounts, Robin Williams was a great support to Christopher Reeve after Christopher Reeve’s accident, and the person wished that someone could have been the same support to Robin. But it’s not that simple. Depression can make you retreat inward at the moment that you need help the most.

Someone in the comments on the New York Times site ("Sam from Seattle") said, "I haven't felt a loss of this magnitude from the death of a non-family member since John Lennon died." It felt like a punch in the gut to me.

Requiescat in pace.

P.S. I'll virtually smack anyone who says that his suicide was "a permanent solution to a temporary problem". That's the most glib, patronizing thing that someone could say. And given that most people who have suffered depression have suffered it on and off MOST OF THEIR LIVES, it doesn't even apply. Some people lose the battle.