Happy Holidays?

So it's almost the holidays - Thanksgiving on Thursday and then of course Christmas next month. The package store is beginning to own my soul. It pretty much does that all season long. I am not excited at all for the holidays. The older I get, the less fun they seem to be, along with everything else. I'm a little depressed. Somehow, and I don't know if it's just because I am feeling a little down, it seems that everyone around me is having a hard time of it too. I don't know if it's the lack of sunshine or cold, or what, but everything seems to be harder lately.

Earlier on in life, I always had a set plan I was on, I guess, and I never really thought about it much. I always just figured that I would figure out what came next when the time came. It's here now, and I don't know what I'm doing. I just happened to finish college when there are no jobs. Apparently I'm not alone in not being able to find one. I feel that I probably would be able to find one if I cared a little more about what I was going to be doing. I care, but I don't at the same time, and it's a dangerous place to be. Many things in my life haven't worked out as planned, for sure, and I never expected anything to be easy, but that won't stop me from wishing it was. I'm lazy as hell. No one is forcing me to do anything. I am applying for jobs because I can't particularly think of anything better to do. I have to do something. I can't keep exploiting my parents forever. I have a feeling if I were forced to do something, I would do it. It would help to have someone who would tell me I was being a weak idiot. No one will. Everyone is all, "Oh, it's not really your fault, the economy sucks, blah blah, it's fine, you'll find something eventually." My favorite is "Why don't you just go back to school then, if you can't find a job." Yeah, a solid plan, except that I am ALREADY in debt and can barely afford to pay those loans, much less attempting to get into a grad school with less than stellar grades, and taking out even MORE loans, so that when I graduate with a Masters or something I can be in even more debt that I am in now, and most likely still jobless. Basically, I would be me, now, with an advanced degree, and lots of debt. It's like a fucking merry-go-round and it's so fucking annoying.

Speaking of annoying - people in general. It might be me, but people have become even more idiotic recently. I feel rather alienated. I talk to very few people. Being the shy person that I am, it is always hard for me to open up to people, so when communication halts between me and another person it's incredibly hard for me to begin communication again. I know that is a poor excuse, but I have always been shy. It's like an ingrained part of me that will never go away. In spite of being shy, I am incredibly social and love to talk. I know, I make no sense, but I am who I am. Therefore, having no one talking to me is making me depressed which in turn makes me even less likely to go out and seek social interaction. Another fucking merry-go-round. I suppose I am just stuck in a rut, and I spend a lot of time thinking about how to go about getting out of it. I like to come up with elaborately detailed plans in my head which I will never follow through on. Most of them require lots more money and a lot more ambition than I seem to have in real life. Reality is almost always more dreary than what I can come up with in my own head, but I suppose that would be the case with most people.

Long and short of this entry is I'm very lonely. I feel sad a lot of the time, defeated, with zero energy. I know it's not helping, but I can't seem to shake it this time. My dog makes me smile more than anything in the world. I love her to death. She is better than any person. She is always there, cuddly and sweet and crazy, and completely huggable. She is a beacon of bright light in my otherwise dreary existence. I do not care how cliche that sentence was, it is entirely the truth. Our lives are plagued by cliches. I of course am still ever hopeful as always that things will turn around. As always, I must remind myself that there are people and things in the world much worse than my life. There are a great many things about my life that I have enjoyed and still enjoy. I try my hardest to focus on the good instead of the bad, to keep a positive attitude even though I know I default to a negative one. Here's to hoping for some Christmas magic to rejuvenate me. There's definitely something wrong when my favorite holiday fails to excite me at all. We shall see.