Hazy shade of winter.

You know how sometimes you have something on your to-do list and you just have a hard time making yourself do it? Something that normally you'd enjoy doing, but, for some reason, this time around it just doesn't want to get done?

I'm so there right now.

Part of it is just the time of year. I know that, and knowing, as they say, is half the battle. I also know that the longer this task hangs over my head, the heavier it'll get. But I'm sitting here trying to pull together this newsletter and a significant part of me just doesn't want to play. "Oh, take a nap," the SAD voice says. "You're so tired. And it's not like they pay you."

"But I don't do it for pay -- I do it because I want to contribute -- and I need to get this done," the part of me that's still rational replies. "It has to be to the printer this afternoon."

That's the weird thing about SAD. More and more, it seems to me to be like a bizarre multiple personality thing. The medication gives the rational side an edge -- it's bolstered enough to speak up. Without the meds I take from fall to spring, the SAD side has full reign -- the rational side is simply overpowered. "You're right -- I probably would miss that bus. Let's just sleep some more." Thinking doesn't really happen. It's more like I just drift in and out of consciousness. And even now, with the meds, it's a struggle sometimes.

I'm entering the hardest part of my year right now. Even though the days are getting longer, there still isn't enough light for me to function normally. I haven't done the research, but my experience tells me that the sunlight deprivation accumulates, and that's why the longer days don't really affect me until about March 17 or so. It's like it takes that long to balance out how much sunlight I get on a daily basis against how much I've been missing for so long. Like I said, this is just my experience, and what my gut says is happening.

And I'll let you in on a little secret. That spring countdown over there on the left isn't for you. It's for me, to reassure me that yes, even though I feel like I'm stuck in interminable zombie-land, the fog is getting closer to lifting. Some days I feel like that ticker is the only thing that keeps me going. And besides the darkness, I feel totally trapped by the ice and snow. I get cold and I stay cold for hours. I know I whine a lot about the weather, but it's just so invasive. It gets to me, inside and out.

They're doing a SAD study at the hospital here in the city. I called the line and left my name and number, but they didn't call back.

Okay, time to get back to the task at hand. The fatigue is stealing over me and I want to at least get some more done before I find out which side -- rational or SAD -- wins the battle this morning.