Olive Drab Bag

Yesterday, I wasn't feeling good. I had a bit of a stomach ache. I laid down around noon. While I was asleep, Sara took down the Christmas tree and packed up the ornaments. When I woke up, I rolled over to her side of the bed and noticed a green messenger bag that I used to carry in college. The bag means a lot to me because it holds so many memories, and if you know me, I have a hard time letting things from my past go.

I must've stared at the bag for ten minutes, each one of those minutes I thought of all the times I walked to and from class and the items I carried in it.

There was a girl in college who liked the bag very much and offered to buy it from me. She offered nearly every time she saw me carry it. At the end, the price she offered was $50. A lot of money for a kid in art school. I always declined because the bag meant so much to me.

While staring at the bag while I was in bed, a strong wave a depression came over me. I've been having these sorts of episodes quite often but this one was different because it involved my past and the mindset I had in college.

I had such big dreams then. The world was so big and my future as a professional designer was endless. I never thought in a million years that it would come to an end the way it did.

So here I am, staring at a green bag, clinically depressed and there was nothing I could do about it except to communicate this to Sara. We had a long conversation about it, and she talked to me about what it meant to be a person in my (our) situation.

Life in college was so simple. I studied, I worked hard for grades, I made friends, I met my future wife. All good things. We talked about what I have now and that my future isn't written yet. This was the kind of conversation I needed to help me though these feelings of regret and remorse.

I still see the bag in our room, and I see it in my mind. I can't say as though I am completely over the depression, but I can see that my life is different than I expected for a reason. I am a man with Epilepsy. A strong man, even though sometimes I feel so weak and defeated.

I'm trying hard to live up to this. I'm trying to use the tools set before me to combat these feelings. They're working just enough to get me out of depression and on to reconstruction of the life I'm destined to lead.

Thank you, Sara.