Whine on, whine on harvest moon

This morning I ran errands and basked in the last of the warm summer air. I could feel the hint of fall in the breeze. I hate that. You probably like fall, many people do. Enjoying brisk mornings and warm afternoons, prancing through piles of golden leaves, carving festive pumpkins. Right. All I can picture is braving cold downpours, splashing through chilly mud puddles, and peering through raindrops covering my glasses. Ugh. Fall. Bleh.

That's what I was thinking as I drank in the warm air this morning. Afterward I came home and uploaded Chapter 4 of my dissertation to the course room. It took 10 minutes to upload, that's how big it is. 30+ megabytes of images and text. Three hundred pages that I hope will make sense to my Chair. Good gawd. Oh well. One more chapter to go. I'm dreading this one. This is the one where I have to sound really smart, the one where I succinctly and concisely and intelligently explain what it all means and what we should do about it. Sigh. Suddenly I feel really tired. Where is all that righteous energy that fired me up to start on this crazy journey back in 2005? Where is all that fervor and froth, now when I need it the most? All I can do is say, meh.

There's a harvest moon tonight, according to my mother. I can barely see it through the wretched holly tree that I wish would shrivel and die. Mom says people are crazier than normal under a harvest moon. Is that true? Do you feel crazier than normal? I feel crazy all the time these days. How do you know what is normal? The world seems pretty normal. Another mass shooting, check. Massive flooding, check. Budget cuts, check. Hurricane, check. Officer-involved shooting, check. Earthquakes, yeah, a few, check. Politics as usual, check. Ho hum. Is that all there is, as the song goes. Remember that song? No, you are probably too young.

I get melancholy this time of year, more morose than usual. The surge of satisfaction I felt at posting Chapter 4 was short-lived and quickly forgotten. I seem to be naturally predisposed to cling to the negative... no, wait a minute. Hey. Aren't I a closet optimist? Yeah, that's right. I forgot until I was about to type the word shunning. What am I shunning? (Have I ever typed that word before today?) According to the Happiness test, I'm not a pessimist, I'm an optimist. Oh no, now I need to rethink my opinion of fall. Aaaaah. I'm losing my mind. Who am I, if not the chronic malcontent? Argh. I despise fall. It makes me feel uncomfortable feelings and think uncomfortable thoughts. I hate that. Time to watch TV.

Tomorrow I will dive into Chapter 5, the last chapter. If there is a god, which I'm not convinced there is, then the approvals will flow toward me with ease and grace. I'll put it all together into one massive masterpiece (bigger is better, right?), defend the crap out of it with a superior PowerPoint, they'll confer and grudgingly give me the secret handshake, and then it will be done. I'm already dreaming about the month-long bath I plan to take. Right after the month-long nap. And if there's not a god, well, wake me when it's over.