(continued)

So I'm staying home by myself, and I feel lousy about it because I was holding tonight in front of me for days as my reward for being good, and it was going to help me get through the work I have to do tomorrow. I feel like I am budgeting my mental and emotional well-being like a physical resource: having fun Tuesday night and Wednesday morning to store up energy so Wednesday afternoon I can spend it on stressful, but necessary, work.

It's like, when people talk about losing weight, the first thing I tell them, is to find a way to be happy first. If it takes all you have to get through your day, there's nothing left to do anything else difficult, like refusing yourself ice cream when you get home. I measure out indulgences so that I have the willpower to do what I need to get done later.

When I started to write this, I was going to say something like:

I'm feeling lousy tonight and I can try to concentrate on being rational. I can give myself the little fixes that will keep me feeling okay, a little melancholy, but not terrible. Or I can just give in and indulge myself in self pity and let it all out and bawl myself to sleep. I kind of think I might be better at the end of it if I just let myself be as miserable as I feel like, and it would get it out of my system or something. Or just that, if neither option is particuarly good, might as well pick the easier one. I almost want to feel sorry for myself.

But then I started writing and got distracted and forgot.