This Column is Depressing (Cigar Smoke 3-12-09)

I’ve always had a problem with depression. It runs in my family. (Or walks, trudges actually, with its head down.) My dad was depressed. My grandmother was depressed. Her father was depressed. And I’m pretty sure my Greek forebears, Plato and Aristotle, were depressed.

I’ve had a lot of therapy over the years. It’s helped a little. Now I pretty much know why I’m depressed. But, when I think of how much money it cost me for that knowledge, I get depressed. I’ve got two friends who are depressed, too. But we’re too depressed to talk about it. We’d all shoot ourselves except we’re such poor shots.

So, how do I deal with depression? Basically, I try to ignore it, or blame it on other people. Especially dead people – it’s very difficult for dead people to defend themselves. But when that fails, I do something that has worked every damn time. I take a road trip.

I just get in the car, light up a semi-cheap cigar and take off. And something always happens that cheers me up. Like last week I was feeling really low, so I decided to drive up to Oregon to visit my empty hovel.

I was buzzing along Highway 5 in the rain, which is not the part that cheered me up, and I had to pee. I saw a sign that said there was a rest stop in 20 miles. I thought me and my bladder could make that, so I kept driving. When we get to the rest stop exit, it says: Closed. Next Rest Stop 52 miles. Mr. Bladder was, excuse the expression, pissed.

Anyway, I couldn’t wait that long, so I found a gas station in a few miles. Got some gas and went in to the Stop N’ Overpay store to get a bottle of water and a lighter. I gave the clerk five bucks and she said, “It’s $11.27, sir?” I said, “For a bottle of water and a $1.99 lighter?” She said, “The lighter is $9.99.”

I looked down and, sure enough, it was $9.99. I inquired as to why it was $9.99. She told me because it had a fingernail clipper hidden inside it.

Now that cheered me up. Finally someone had invented something I’ve needed. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve been lighting a cigar and I’ve said to myself, “God, I wish I could cut my fingernails right now, too.” It’s just a shame they didn’t come up with this lighter/fingernail clipper earlier. I could have saved a bundle in psychiatry bills. It’s depressing.

Oh, well. Got back on the road and drove along the California Aqueduct for a while, and remembered many years ago seeing a pilot fly his open-cockpit crop-duster right over my head and he had a Snoopy scarf blowing behind him in the wind and it made me smile. The road comes through. Again.

I got to the Kettleman City turnoff. I always stop at Mike’s Diner for lunch. It’s one of those cluttered Cracker Barrel kind of places with kids’ wagons and old Texaco signs and license plates on the walls. I ordered a chicken tostada. (Yes, I’m going to tell you what I ate for breakfast soon.) When I took my first bite of chicken, I thought something wasn’t right. It did not taste like chicken. It did not taste like anything I had ever eaten before. It tasted like an unlucky circus animal. But it did get me out of my own head. It’s hard to be depressed while eating a lion tostada.

That night I stayed at a Holiday Inn and my avalanche of cheerfulness continued. I turned on the TV and I saw a bunch of teenage guys chasing emus around in a field. Yes, emus. Big, clumsy, ostrich-like emus. Yee-haw! Take that, depression.

The next morning I had breakfast at IHOP. (I told you.) Every time I eat there, I get real serious and lower my voice and I ask the waitress, “Do you guys have pancakes?” And every time, her reaction cheers me up. But then I look at the seven kinds of syrup to choose from, and I go back down.

After breakfast I drove three hours out of my way to see a little mountain town called Hayfork. I’d always wanted to see it. I don’t want to see it again. Then I zigzagged and car-sicked my way through hours of switchbacks and slushy snow and I got to the Eureka Bay in Humboldt County. Now, I’m not saying the rainy, foggy, cold, sludge-filled bay is not attractive, but their slogan is “Our Harbor is Uglier than Your Butt.”

I ate lunch at a neat little place at the marina. And I swear to God, as I’m eating my tuna melt, the waitress comes up to me and says, “Would you run with the bulls?” Out of nowhere. “Would you run with the bulls?” So I said, “Would you share what you’re smoking?” She looked quizzical. I said, “Honey, I wouldn’t even walk with the cows.”

By the time you read this, I’ll be home again. Why don’t you come on over. I’ll light up a cigar for you. And clip your nails.