I’m sad today though not for any particular reason. Usually, this is when I write my best when I’m gloomy without a rainstorm. Today, I’m sitting at my desk trying to find inspiration. I listened to two episodes of a podcast called, Terrible (Thanks For Asking), which was good but added to this underlying wretchedness I have. I don’t have a problem with being sad sometimes. My issue is that today I can’t seem to use it to write something good.

I am on my third attempt of finding inspirational writing music. Usually, I don’t write to music because I like everything to be silent. Otherwise, I get distracted. It’s stunning the crazy stuff people write to; anything from Iron Maiden to Disney music. I’ve found an awful lot of Game of Throne and Lord of The Rings soundtracks.

Personally, I gravitate towards scores composed by John Williams, but if I listen to him, I’m afraid I’ll write stories starring an alien farm boy haunted by stories of his dead war hero father or else an anthropology professor searching for buried treasure. Or worse, I’ll write about an Anthropological farmer with a mega-sized daddy-issue that carries both a bullwhip and a light sword and bounces around the universe searching for alien treasure. Genius.

Something’s in the air—some shift I can’t quite put my writing fingers on. Perhaps it started this morning? My dog Zoey and I finally went for a walk. The temperature was a balmy 50 degrees Fahrenheit, as opposed to the 30 degrees it has been. Except for trills of traffic, inconsistent and waning as the morning wore on, outside was silent. The sun hadn’t come up yet, but the sky was clear, and the air was crisp. Above us, an arrow of geese cut through the blue, honking, I assume, directions to one another. The strange thing about it was that they were flying north when at this time of year, shouldn’t they be flying south? They’re probably Canadian Geese heading home.

Maybe it’s the podcast I listened to where the last episode talked about not comparing your pain to someone else’s. I know, I know, it sounds excruciating! However, I can’t help but wonder if I’m feeling this way because I listened to the episode, or if I was drawn to it because I feel this way? I suppose it doesn’t matter.

I call this mood, going dark—which I’ve discovered is the term used by FBI agents when describing a person who isolates themselves right, right before they do something terrorizing— which is not at all what I do.

When I go dark, I just don’t like to leave my house or put on makeup. I take long, long baths, and crave buckets of ice cream. I should probably change the name of this mood. Should I call it, at the risk of sounding like the title of a Life Time original movie, going melancholy, instead?

I know this state I’m in is temporary, which is all the more reason I want to use it to write. So I guess the point of this post is that the sun is out, bright and shining, but I can’t stop noticing how many shadows it casts.