It's Saturday (again)

You know what's a bigger number than 29?

Thirty. 

This is Saturday number 30 in the Confined Kitchen. We shall drink our 30th Confined Cocktails at 7.

I'm not quite sure what to do with that basic piece of counting.  It's making me feel a bit vertiginous. 

But anyway. I finished the last tinned Pimms last night, in the dark and cool of an October night (not sure what I was doing pouring it out tbh, I didn't have any strawberries and mint for summery garnish, but I may not have been thinking all that clearly). I shall be on a more seasonally-apt red wine this evening.

 

It's also, not incidentally, World Mental Health Day today. We may feel that the quite large number of "it's time to talk about mental health" days could perhaps more usefully be supplemented by actual provision of mental health support for people in dire need. But I find them useful still to talk about for people not in dire need, but still feeling fairly suboptimal. Vertiginous, perhaps. Shut in, tired, despairing, perhaps. It sucks to feel that way, but it's also okay. You really aren't alone. I'm really not alone.

I do a fair few Covid studies, because my data is something I can at least contribute to the global effort against this bastard virus. A monthly one came up this week, asking the usual about symptoms and also emotions. How many days last week did you feel down and depressed? Take little pleasure in doing things? One or two, maybe, is my baseline. Or I may have had a cracking week and be at zero for a change, which is nice. But then came: How many days last week did you feel anxious about the future/find yourself worrying too much about different things?

Right now, if I'm honest, I don't know what "worrying too much about different things" looks like. Worrying a fair bit about a range of stuff that's getting worse quite quickly? That feels pretty normal to me. That feels rational. I liked this article from the Irish Times, which looks as if it's going to be one of those "my cancer taught me Important Life Lessons" drivels, but is actually "when you've once experienced having your life totally fucked over, you may recognise that feeling when it happens again but to absolutely everyone". It seems quite helpful to me. And includes the description "this bizarre, confusing slump of a moment", which rang many bells. Welcome to our confusing slump! 

I am particularly thinking about coping strategies because I've had my last lovely Saturday restorative yoga today. The class is ending for studio business plan reasons I don't 100% get, but anyway, they are struggling and I'm not going to add my whinge. I haven't always got on with restorative classes, pre-covid. They are the most static, quiet, immobile form of yoga - permission to basically lie on your face for an hour, with some cushions and the odd blanket to make it cosy. In a busy Before Times week, that often felt like a low priority. But it's been really helpful to me, this year, to have that hour a week set aside for not coping, not wrangling, not doomscrolling, not caregiving, not exercising, not solutioneering or strategising or worrying about other people. Just being, because it was nice and made me feel a bit better. I'm going to miss it. And I highly recommend, if you don't have an equivalent hour of Just Being Nice To Yourself sorted, that you try to put one in for the winter. 

Reminder that our 31st Confined Cocktails next weekend will be preceded by a #ConfinedCookalong from 3.30. Brownies, blondies, bakes... whatever seems good to you, and whenever you can join us. Maybe that can be your Being Nice to Yourself hour for next week. I hope it helps.