mtpolitics.net

Why The Burst of Posting?

My good friends who have been around a while know that I go through fits and starts and have a real love-hate relationship with keeping this site going.

The last year or so has been particularly up and down, with me going so far as to putting up a “CLOSED” sign.

As I’ve said over and over and over again, this is just a small blog (getting smaller every day) about a guy who is trying to raise his family and gets to sp(r)out off his opinion.

With that has come a bit of a public profile, albeit small, that I’ve had to keep in mind.

If you’ve taken the time to read the about page, you know that I’m a public employee, which makes it problematic for me to discuss “Montana Politics.” In the grand scheme of things, I not only work for the people of Montana, but my ultimate boss is our governor.

Now, given my political bent, and our governor’s political bent, I find myself at odds with him frequently. However, the man is ultimately my boss, and I’m not going to tell tales out of school, as it were. Understand that I’m so far removed from the governor on the proverbial totem pole that I can’t even see the bottom of the totem pole from where I am, but still and all . . .

Now I honestly doubt that he would hold anything against me if I were to criticize him here (Hi Gov!), but it’s always been my feeling that you don’t tell stories out of school, no matter how far you are removed from the principal.

So, you won’t hear anything from me about anything coming out of the Governor’s office until I’m working for someone else.

Anyway, that’s tangential to the main point, which is “Why the up and down?”

Long time readers will long note my references to “The Big Blue Room.” Well, the Big Blue Room has thrown some oddball stuff at me over the past year, and you, dear reader, know approximately .01% of it. The rest has been a bit like the proverbial 98 pound weakling going 10 rounds against Muhammad Ali.

The end result has ended up with me battling an actual diagnosed case of clinical depression. (Some readers will want to note that this was back in August.) Twiddling the meds hasn’t done any good, but talking with a counselor has hit some insights that has brought me back ’round a little bit.

Kim has probably guessed at some of this per an IM conversation.

I used to be in the “Why Can’t They Just Get Over It” camp, when it came to depression. As I’ve said before, I’m an extrovert and an optimist, so depression wasn’t something that I could grok.

Now, I know a little differently.

Things are still likely to be up and down as I go. I salute Kim for being as forthright as she has, and credit her for giving me the gumption to open my own guts to the wind.

I’m depressed, and when it comes to the blog, I’ll probably be erratic, but at the end of the day, I’m still an optimist. People are fundamentally good; this is a fundamentally good place to live, and I’m always just a phone call or an email away if you need me.

Sorry for this disjointed rambling, but I felt I owed you the explanation, since you’ve been hanging around so long.

I’ll still be yakking about the “Montana” part and touching on the “Politics,” and I hope that my co-authors will fill in where I leave off. It’s all about the discussion, folks. This is a good example of how we can hash out an issue; agree to disagree, then get on about our day.

And that’s the way it should be.