You Can't Get Rid of Me That Easy.

       It seems for most people 2016 has been a rough year. As usual, I was ahead of the curve and my nightmares started in 2015.  I was in a car accident on Super Bowl Sunday that left me shaken but unscathed but that was to be the least of my issues.  I posted on and off all through 2015 right up until what would seem a very exciting time for me, the Mets going deep into the playoffs.  I posted on the day of that first postseason game in nine years, and then aside from an auto-post on Christmas and a couple of Hall of Fame induction posts that I already pretty much had written out, nothing.  This blog has been silent. Why, you ask?  It is on that aforementioned October night that our story begins...

These are the Mets holiday parallel cards from that big box store I don't shop in.

I will not bore you too much with the details of this story as I have told it a few too many times and I have grown weary of it.  Plus it is kind of horrifying and gross but I will hit the important parts, though. I watched that first playoff game with a great deal of anticipation, obviously.  I sat in my big comfy chair and did not get out of it the whole night.  The Mets won a tight and tidy 3-1 victory and as the final out was made, I got up to do the business we all have to do.  That is when things turn ugly.  The last thing I remember was fainting on the toilet. I hit my head and passed out.  I woke up in a pool of blood, feces, and throw up and I could barely move.  This was not a pretty picture and I was in trouble.  911 was called and an ambulance came and some very well trained EMTs scooped me up and took me to the hospital.  I was cleaned up and put on fluids as they tried to figure out what was going on with me.  I was there one day, then two, and so on.  No food could go in me, nothing but blood and pain was coming out of me.  Two of the finest doctors on the eastern seaboard were looking over me and on day three, I asked them point blank what was wrong with me.  They looked at each other and shrugged - they actually shrugged.  I was in real trouble.  Test after test was done to me, pint after pint of blood was going into me.  I didn't eat anything solid for nine days.  As a last resort, they gave me a little camera pill, like something out of the Jetsons, to go through my gastrointestinal tract and if that didn't find anything, they were going to have to cut me open.  I swear this is the short version of this story and to tighten it up even further, yes, they found out what was wrong with me without having to cut me open.  I had a hidden hole in a hard to reach part of my intestines (the jejunum for those who like hard to pronounce medical words).  Rest and no food eventually healed it up.  I was in the hospital for a couple weeks.  I was an absolute wreck physically and emotionally for months.  The physical part eventually healed and my strength and stamina returned.  My emotional state, usually pretty precarious to begin with, was not so easily dealt with. 

Since all I have done is vent in this post, let me say a belated Happy Holidays and to everyone reading.

Near death experiences are supposed to energize you, instead with old contrarian me, it has put me in a deep funk.  Every time I think it is getting better, I realize it isn't.  Old things that used to make me happy simply don't.  New things bore me.  I have never been so down or inconsolable and that is saying something.  Every day is a struggle and every moment I am left alone with my thoughts makes me more depressed. I have tried everything I could think of to help myself to very little success.  I wish I could tell you I have figured it all out but I haven't.  Right now emotional survival is the key.  I haven't much wanted to blog because I really haven't been collecting much and what I have hasn't brought me much joy.  I am a red hot mess.

They didn't scan too well, but these are the shiny metallic foil ones.

Not to sound like some kind of inspirational trinket bought at the mall, but happiness is a choice.  It has been about 14 months that I have been Greco-Roman Wrestling these demons on a daily, practically hourly basis, and this New Year's seems like as good a day to just turn my back on them.  Oh, I am going to be very aware of my mental health but I am going to make a concerted effort to streamline this process that has just been exhausting.  I am not sure if it will work or not, but one thing I do desperately miss is the happiness that card collecting brought me and the fun and feedback I got from writing my blog.  So that is what I am going to do.  I am going to drag myself kicking and screaming back to my old self.  I have tried every other damn thing and maybe now is the time for the the direct approach, which I know seems obvious to some but for me it is novel because my head is a wacky place and I tend to outsmart myself when I keep things simple.  At this point it seems I have nothing left to lose.  I have been slowly reacclimating myself to old friends and my family and while it hasn't snapped me out of things quite yet, it wasn't nearly as hard as my brain has been making it out to be.  So this week, I am going to start this blog up again and I trust that the 12 of you who used to read it will do so again.  Wish me luck.  And a very Happy New Year to you all.