An afternoon of early November

It’s a bit past 2 pm. A warm and sunny afternoon in early November. The noise of a chainsaw in the distance, the wind blowing through the yellow leaves still attached to the now half-naked trees. The dog is sniffing around, clearly enjoying his time outside. It’s warm, probably way too warm considering we’re in November. Seasons are all over the place. I’m sitting here, my back against the closed door of this church built in 1535, basking in the Sun. Need to do my part to cure this Vitamin D deficiency. My mind is all over the place. I’m realizing now that for months (years?) I lived not fully in the present. Everything I was doing, everything I’m doing, is in function of future goals. But this way of living is taking a toll on my mental health and it’s now spreading to my physical health as well. It’s taking me weeks to recover from what should be a normal season flu and that’s not fine. I took more meds in the past few weeks than in the previous 5 years. That’s clearly not ok. I know the whole situation is not ok. Conceptually I understand this. But as is often the case with mental struggles, understanding something at a conceptual level only takes you that far. Knowing you’re in a hole doesn’t really help you jump out of it. But writing helps me put things into perspective. No one’s going to solve my issues. When it comes to inner struggles, the best you can hope for is compassion from the people around you. And that’s already hard to find. But I know things are gonna be fine. It’s only a matter of figuring out the best path out of this hole. I’m a hiker, after all, I’ll walk my way out of this.