Hiding In Plain Sight

Someone asked me if I was depressed the other day. "So what if I am?", was my first response, my gut reaction. In talking about it with another friend yesterday, he told me that being asked that was nothing he wouldn't do also, and that if he was suspicious that I was he'd call me out on it. I'm afraid he's not the only one that would do so either. Urgh!

If I am depressed, I doubt anyone would ever really know it either. I feel like I hide in plain sight pretty well. I know the right answers, I smile and look pretty. I can fake it pretty darn well - hell, I've been doing it for years. "What would be your dead giveaway?", I want to ask these people who are so apt to call me out on my melancholia? But I don't, because I know deep down they only care. And also I know that it could lead into a conversation about my tells, and frankly, if I keep them, I keep a part of me that I'm refusing to surrender out of stubbornness. Sometimes I do hide a pretty wicked case of the blues. But knowing that I'm keeping this secret, I need to ask myself these questions - Is it right? Is it healthy? Is it good for me? No, and I know that. Does that reduce the temptation to do it anyways? Not always. Most days I'm lucky to be living vulnerably and authentically, and am kept from doing something that I could so easily get away with, hiding it all away. Most days I'm surrendered to that fact. Today I'm fighting it like a wild stallion being bridled.

I guess I'm just upset today, and I can't figure out why. Mother's Day does this to me. A few MD's back my mom and I got into a huge fight that ended a week later with her in a terribly bad situation and left me feeling guilty for years after. I walk on eggshells every single Mother's Day, and I straddle the line between being grateful for the mom's in my life that pour their love into me almost daily, and feeling sorry for myself because of the broken relationship my own mother and I have. How do I celebrate something that I don't experience with much joy or excitement?

Sometimes I just want a normal, happy, 1950's family. Other times I just want to be left alone. Sometimes I'm close to being depressed, yes. But I always count my blessings and know that my joy comes from God, who loves me like no earthly parent ever will. There is a fine line, a strict balance between the blues that want to overtake me and a heart of gratitude. No matter how my emotions feel one day to the next, I know I'll be ok.

Today, as I was driving home from our Mother's Day brunch, where I was blessed with the company of people who love me, I couldn't help but just want to listen to sad songs. First "Nobody Girl" by Ryan Adams came on, and it couldn't have been more appropriate.

Better off as a fool than the owner of that kind of heart,
They don't know you anyway
They don't know you and they don't watch you walk away
Just a nobody girl....
You say you follow you heart
Well honey, you're just being lost
You say you follow your gut
Well honey how much does it cost?
They don't know you anyway
They don't know you and they don't watch you walk away
Just a nobody girl.

But a few minutes later, this song came on. I think it fits much better, and at the end of the car ride, it's the one I'm going to walk away singing

In open fields of wildflowers

She breathes the air and flies away

She thanks her Jesus for the daisies and the roses

In no simple language

Someday she'll understand the meaning of it all

He's more than the laughter or the stars in the heaven

As close as a heartbeat or song on her lips

Someday she'll trust Him, learn how to see Him

Someday He'll call her and she will come running

And fall in His arms, the tears will fall down and she'll pray

"I want to fall in love with You."