March madness

Like the hare in Alice in Wonderland, March is the month I go mad.

I don't know what it is - whether it's the effects of a long winter, whether it's spring fever, whether it's just a kind of annual clock built into me - but every March, my brain melts and I flip my life upside down. March is the month I walked into my old PR company and quit without any forethought; March is the month I tried to win BJITW; March is the month I fell in love with The Boy from 6,000 miles away, and - exactly one year later - it's also the month we broke up; March is the month I quit my job in Tokyo, flew home to England for five days and then flew back to Japan, crying the whole way. Every single year, in March my ability to reason goes out of the window. And every single March, I go totally bonkers.

I was early this year. I started going bonkers about ten days ago, which is why I've avoided writing this blog: even a mad person knows that you shouldn't write in public where everybody can read it when you're being a mad person.

And make no mistake: I'm totally crazy. I'm crying, I'm clawing at walls, I'm talking to myself, I'm flushed and itchy and constantly scowling. My writing - of which this post is an example - is completely incoherent, verging on bullshit. I'm having the most dreary dreams in the world which mean I'm foul as soon as I wake up, because real life is boring enough without making it last another ten hours every day. I hate everybody in the world, and I mean everybody: I screeched at my mum yesterday because she was talking about her brand new sugar bowl and I didn't want to, and this morning I shouted at a five year old who whacked my left breast and called me "grandma" without finding it in the least bit amusing. My confidence is zero; nothing is funny, nothing is interesting, and I'm so bored I want to rip my hair out, except that I also currently hate my hair and it will only make it worse. And I'm driving too fast because (and this shows I'm crazy) I'm secretly hoping something happens. Nothing bad, but just... something. I don't normally hope something happens when I drive: only in March.

And - most importantly - I am desperate to flip my life upside down again, but I don't know where to flip it to. I'm lonely, bored, deeply uninspired, and I want out of Japan, but I don't know where to go next. And I can't work it out, because the March madness means that I'm spending a couple of hours a day Googling working on a ranch in Mexico or teaching scuba diving in Jamaica (when I can't scuba dive), before I inevitably end up dissolving into a bonkers panic, screaming, throwing something, ringing somebody up just so that I can shout at them and then falling on to my bed, clawing at my chest and telling the walls how useless I am.

Normally, my life is like a pancake: incredibly easy to turn upside down. But this year it feels stuck to the bottom of the pan and I don't know what to do to make it loose again. Walking out of jobs, falling in love, breaking my heart, moving countries: all tempting, but unfortunately impossible this March.

So I'm just going to have to sit it out and see what happens. And hope that when April comes I'm just a fool, and I don't get trapped forever in March: a mad hare at my own bonkers tea party.

Surrounded by goddamn new sugar bowls.