Seasonal Affective Disorder

A little ditty about a dull day

There’s a ladybug on my windowsill and it’s sunny but somehow water is dripping on the metal roof. My stomach gurgles from the sip of wine I just took and Alexa wants to give me wellness tips. (when I read this paragraph out loud I have to tell her to shut up) It’s a little chilly and the heat pops on, just when I think about giving it a nudge, like it knew what I needed. Regardless of how patient I am, I am not the most interesting thing in this room. The ladybug is. And she will never make it out alive. It will be my job to tell her story, how on a 30-degree day in October, Halloween to be exact, she awoke in a warm cabin in the woods only to bang into a window repeatedly. She doesn’t realize if I open that window, she will die, or maybe she doesn’t care.

The sunlight is warm on my face as I watch her gossamer wings spread and then fold back under her red beetle shell as she tries to decide what to do from the sill, stand still or slam into the glass again and again. Soon she is joined by another and they race around the window frame like there is a mission at hand, but other than to find an escape, I can’t imagine what it is they seek. They will do this all afternoon, circle the window in a strange ladybug dance until the sun goes down and they fall back to the sill, dried husks of what they could have been, what they could have done, if only it were springtime.