the blue sky beyond

Last night, I ventured away from home for the first time since my depression struck. I headed over to the Yorkshire coastal town of Filey with my good friend Scott, to visit one of our mates who had hit a spot of marriage bother. It seems he has been digging himself a rather deep hole following a relatively innocuous run-in with his wife some weeks ago, and has successfully transformed the proverbial molehill into a pretty imposing mountain. The upshot of this is that he has been banished to Filey for two weeks (where the family have a very respectable holiday flat) in order to give them both some space to see a way forward - we hope.

As far as banishment destinations go, Filey ain't half bad. It retains real Victorian charm and a grand seafront facade, reflecting the days when it was arguably the north of England's most fashionable address. It has also manged to shun much of the tawdry tack and tat which is so evident among its better-known neighbours, Scarborough to the north and Bridlington to the south.

A full inquest was duly held into our friend's marital traumas, lubricated by several pints of real ale and St Paddy's Day Guinness. This was rounded off by a devilishly hot pizza, some rather forthright red wine and a thrashing on the pool table at the hands of a fairly amiable, but fiendishly competitive, local bricklayer. I fail to remember whether we consumed more booze back at the flat afterwards, but it's unlikely that we were able to continue our incisive forensic examination of the partnership in question - and womankind in general - without further fortification, and this morning's hangover pointed to the same conclusion.

Still, it was an absolutely glorious spring morning at the coast when we finally left - the sky was a perfect blue and the horizon over the sea was as sharp and straight as a blade. As we returned by the edge of the Wolds, however, the mist and fog closed in on us so that, by the time we were back in York, we were hemmed in by uniform greyness. It matched my mood as I struggled to shift the effects of the night before and felt a vague dread of the depression re-asserting itself.

As the morning wore on, though, I began to see the symmetry between the meteorological conditions above and the state of affairs in my own head. Sure, there was fog, mist and seemingly impenetrable cloud; there looked to be no way through, no respite, and no indication as to where or how the oppression might break up. And yet... there was blue sky beyond all this. There always is. My drive from Filey made me certain of this: I had seen it with my own eyes, and I felt sure that it was only a matter of time before the sun burned away the clouds and a perfect blue emerged once more over York.

Sure enough it did - a small patch at first, then layers of grey dissolved, slowly but surely, to leave everything clear and the daffodils a vivid yellow in the sunlight. And this is what I must remember about my depression - however gloomy, overcast and confused everything seems, there is always blue sky beyond, if only we will give it the time it needs to reappear. Wishing for it - or indeed working at it - won't make it happen any more quickly. The clouds will lift when the time is right.