extra feelings?

i sometimes struggle to understand that i feel like i have like extra feelings

like, some days, i’m so happy that it can’t even be called happiness anymore

but mostly, i have this sadness that i can’t quite call sadness

because everything in my life right now is kind of perfect

i’m surrounded by such good energy

and i radiate such good energy

it’s just that some days, i’m sad-ish?

i’m happy, i really am

on most days that is

some days?

i can acknowledge that everything is going great and i’m feeling more like myself than i ever have before

but when i breathe, my breath is deep and heavy

i have so much energy, but sometimes when i move, i feel like i can’t make another step

it’s not sadness, it’s not depression,

it’s a third thing… a third, worse thing

i don’t feel solemn, i don’t want to cry

i just want to take a break.

a permanent break.

but just in the moment, just for a moment

then, just like that, i’m happy again.

i’m not suicidal, at least not anymore, but once or twice i day, i just want it all to stop.

but not so deeply as a depressed person would.

i’m not quite sad, but in that moment i’m not quite happy either

i wish i could get rid of this third feeling,

this looming, eerie, constantly present down mood

it’s not depression, i mean sometimes it is

but today it’s not.

just an extra feeling, one that i can’t quite shake

so in that moment i’ll light a cigarette, bump the most hype-worthy Afrobeats music i can find,

and with each inhale, that third feeling lessens

until i’m done with the cigarette, done with the feeling

then i’m back. restored.

maybe this is how addiction starts, but honestly, i’d do anything to not feel that third feeling, that extra feeling.

maybe one day i’ll learn to deal with it, that not-quite sad but not-quite happy feeling

until then, puff, inhale, hold, exhale.