An Introvert’s Paradise

Disoriented, I woke up in my bed. Like always, for four months straight, it was already noon. I put down my phone after checking the time and rubbed my temples. A faint ache had gathered in that area that always comes from oversleeping- sort of my body’s way of reprimanding me for being such a lazy-ass. Honestly, I couldn’t keep track of how many days I’d woken up and felt like ending it. I was tired of my endless quest for happiness or any sort of motivation. It sure as hell wasn’t in myself, the music I listened to or the films and books I consumed. It seemed nowhere yet everywhere, just always out of my reach. That’s straight to the point and unwarranted, I know. But frankly, I suppose that’s what personal essays are all about, right? Brutal honesty? Here’s some more brutal honesty; I hadn’t written in a while, though I used to pride myself on frequent literary pursuits. Most of my screenplays and novel manuscripts had been left widely unfinished on my laptop. And for months, I’d laid on my bed attending all my Zoom classes then crying for the rest of the day.

Though my limbs ached from the several weeks I’d spent indoors idle, I still didn’t want to get up. My brain proved to be a steady weight in my noggin that anchored my being to my resting place; My pillow. My bed. My bedroom. My solace. The extra pounds I had gradually acquired in my already overweight body were splayed all around me like an unwelcome menace, taunting me for my poor decisions of ordering takeout non-stop over the last year rather than cooking healthier meals. It had been more than a year since COVID-19 decided to ravage the world and social distancing rules were put in place. Not that it mattered much to me, social distancing. As an introvert, I was already as socially distant as they come. It’s just that there was trouble in this supposed introvert’s paradise; I had come to realize I was still as unhappy as I was pre-pandemic. I’d thought it would be great to not have to face as many people as before. However, I still couldn’t shake a certain itch in my mind. Daily, I heard tales of how people missed seeing their loved ones and friends in person. For me, each time I heard such tales, it unfailingly proved a reminder of my failure to be a social member of our species. And it lingered like an insect that just wouldn’t die. Soon, I found a way to pull myself off my pizza-stained bedsheets and headed to my shelf. I let my vision scroll through the contents on it until I sighted a familiar orange-tinged plastic bottle. I grabbed the small plastic cylinder and shook its contents within. Then I popped some antidepressants into my mouth (that I’d concluded eons ago would never work but I’d grown to take them out of an unshakeable habit).

I walked over to my window and pulled open the blinders. The sunlight that suddenly pooled into my dingy cave of a room was blinding and I felt the urge to hiss like a vampire. I already felt like throwing up as a side effect from my medication. The abrupt lighting didn’t help either. Shortly, I got irritated and cursed as I rubbed my temples again. Some awful soul started honking their car outside my apartment and nearby construction began. All sorts of misery inducing sounds flooded into my abode; drilling, beeping, screeching, grinding- you name it. I went to my kitchenette to go cook my breakfast. And by “cook”, I mean microwave. And by “breakfast”, I mean a bunch of chicken hotdogs. I’d wolfed it down in mere minutes, washing it all down with a mug of black coffee. Just for a few seconds, I relished the high bingeing food typically gave me. But just as soon as it came, it vanished. And I plummeted straight back to misery. It was a Saturday so I had no Zoom classes, thank God. But that also meant I didn’t have much else to do either. Though social distancing rules had loosened recently, I had no friends. So what weekend plans did I have exactly?

I picked up my Ukulele and tried playing a few Arctic Monkeys songs. But while listening to each strum, I wanted to throw the instrument out my window. Or throw up. I suspected the latter was due to my medication acting up again. It seemed like nothing was worth doing. Nothing could make me happy. And so, I succumbed to my last resort to pass time; the internet. I tumbled down a cyber rabbit hole of endless Youtube videos and Instagram posts and ‘tea’ on what this celebrity did to this other celebrity. It was exhausting, but what else was left to do? What else could make me feel better? What else could make life worth living?

That was when some writing contests on my social media feed caught my attention. I clicked through them and read the requirements for each competition. Instantly, my gears started rumbling. Instantly, I was given a purpose. I finally dusted off my laptop and got busy finishing a few of my manuscripts I would submit to these contests. I barely noticed my medication induced nausea, I paid the construction work noise outside my room no mind, and I didn’t even once give into my urge to comfort eat. Soon, a soothing darkness trickled into my abode once again and I realized night time had come around. After ending a manuscript by hitting the full stop key on my laptop with a flourish, I sat there at my desk in silence. I had a revelation; the writing competitions I found had saved me that day. They’d single handedly slightly pulled me out of the deep well that was my depression and made the idleness of quarantine a bit more bearable.

Smiling, I got up from my seat and stretched till my eyelids drooped sleepily. While tucking myself into bed, my mind was already vibrant with all the tales I could write for the contests over the next few weeks. And for once, the itch of my perpetual misery was scratched. So I was content, at least, only if for a night.

So my friends, as you can see, this is no exciting or particularly big story on something like meeting Beyonce, winning over a hot guy or hiking up a mountain. This is just the extraordinarily insignificant yet extraordinarily significant day a depressive got the courage to pull herself out of her pandemic slump to give life another shot. A feeble one, but a shot nonetheless. I decided to stop feeling sorry for myself, stop using my depression always as an excuse, and I decided to seize life by the reins and finish my manuscripts for the writing contests I found by sheer luck. Once again, I felt like I had a purpose; writing was and still is my motivation to keep taking on life, one step at a time.