Message to my Bad Mood

Hey old friend. How are you? I'd like to say it's nice to see you but, it's not. Not at all. I don't remember inviting you...but here you are.

What brought you to darken my door this time? I hope it's not the whole insomnia thing, I can't seem to shake that. I'm sure a smart person would point out that I've been sleeping in with the kids until 9 or so every morning and what I am now coining "insomnia" is really "the time normal people go to bed". But whatever.

I first noticed your presence yesterday. One of my kids did something that on a good day, wouldn't even register as a blip on my Bitch Radar. But yesterday it did. I was a tool to one of my kids and although I felt bad almost immediately after, I didn't apologize. I left for Costco. When I got home the kid who had been on the receiving end of my spiteful shrew-rant had left for the evening, and I was left alone with you, a Super Sized bag of Angie's Kettlecorn and a pile of regret.

Today you came with me to my therapy appointment. My therapist encouraged me to whisk you away by thinking positive thoughts. I thought I got rid of you, but then as I was pulling out of the parking lot you came back. Just in time to show me how slow everyone else was driving, and how the highway system in our city sucks. From there, you reminded me of how life would be easier if I had a nice car with tires that didn't need to be filled with air every couple of days, and from that you segued into a whole pathetic tale of woe about how every problem in the world, including the BP spill and strife in the Middle East, would be solved if Big Daddy would pay some child support.

You always manage to bring everything back to that, and that's precisely why I need you to get the hell out of here. Thinking of him and the should've and could've things only saps my precious positive energy. You, my bad mood, always bring him back to the forefront of things instead of keeping him locked up in the box in my head marked "Big Fucking Mistakes".

My therapist told me to take a few minutes every day and write down the good things in my life. She said it could be anything, from the decadent and evil Special K bars that my neighbor makes to the fact that my four kids are all happy and healthy. So I did that, and your crabby, bitter rants became softer.

I talked to one of my girlfriends, the one who bugs you the most because she's like Polly-Fuckin'-Anna on speed. She said she'd noticed you lingering nearby for the past couple of days and was just going to wait until you left before mentioning anything. But you know what I told her? I told her that I can't always see you. See, I just noticed you yesterday, but she saw you earlier in the week. So she made a deal with me.

The next time she sees you around me, she's going to help me kick the shit out of you. Yes, we're going to kick your sorry, dark-cloud, glass-half-empty, Debbie Downer ass all the way back to where you came from. Just knowing this has pushed you halfway out the door. Just knowing that I have a friend who cares enough about me to hold my hand while we go medieval on you takes away a lot of your power. I think watching William's Little League game tonight will get rid of you completely. And if that doesn't work, I have some kettlecorn left.

So, bad mood...it's your choice. Stay where you're not wanted, or do the wise thing and leave. You can come back in two weeks when that skank PMS swings through. Although she is twice as potent as you (makes you look like a basket of kittens, actually) at least with that one there is a definitive beginning and ending, and a biological excuse. You, my old nemesis, are as mysterious as you are annoying.

I leave you with a line from the fabulous Ms. Gloria Gaynor:

Go on now go walk out the door
just turn around now
'cause you're not welcome anymore

Don't let that door hit you on the way out. And close it behind you, for God's sake. I'm not paying to cool off the whole neighborhood.