Day 75: Growing Pains

I know that some of you just want to slap me when I write about how "hard" life is for me. After all, I'm not dying of cancer or being thrown out on the street, or anything awful like that. I'm not blind; my house isn't flooded; my kids aren't hooked on heroin; I don't have chronically bad gas; I don't hate my boss (I don't even have a boss); I'm not a republican -- so what's my problem?

When you hear me complain about how depressed I am I'm sure you just want to shake me and scream, "Hey, there are tons of people worse off than you and you don't hear them whining about it all the time!" When I complain about how hard it is for me to lose weight you must want to shout, "Just eat less crap you fucking pig!" When I say I'm lonely you no doubt think, "Then go out and find somebody. The world is full of women looking for fat, depressed guys like you."

Believe it or not, I feel that same way. Sometimes I just want to shake myself and yell, "Get over it already!" I want to look at the positive things in my life -- my boys, my friends, my career, my health, my "stuff", my skills, -- and feel good about that life.

There are those who look at me, I know, and say, "You're unhappy because you want to be unhappy." To those people I say, "Kiss my sad ass!" Closer to the truth, I think, would be, "I'm unhappy because that's the only way I know how to be."

Pardon me if I complain as I struggle to learn how to be happy.