My misery doesn't even like company.

That I've had a long-standing relationship with depression is no secret, dirty, little or otherwise. I've tried the pills, which worked for a bit before they didn't anymore. I've tried the shrinks, but soon couldn't figure out why I was paying these people to listen to me tell the same damn stories I'd been paid to write for the past however many years. After that, I pretty much stopped trying to do anything about it. The depression and I learned to live together, and in time its severity eased.

Over the past couple of years, for any number of reasons I can point to, it hasn't been that much of a burden. Just another thing to deal with, some shadowy creature that's there under the surface, lurking about without interfering too much.

Every once in a while, though, it'll get its claws in me again. I can rarely predict when this will happen, or why. Sometimes I wake up, and it'll be on me. Sometimes it seeps in as I'm sitting on the train on my way into work. Sometimes I'll be sitting at the bar when it settles in around me without any obvious justification.

The other day it got me during the morning commute. By the time I reached the office, it felt like most of my internal organs had slipped down to my knees, and the muscles in my face lacked the strength to do much of anything but sag. My head was empty and dry, and I found it impossible to focus on anything except the force of gravity.

There was nothing woeful about it; I was not bemoaning my lot. It was more physical than anything?everything was just slow and heavy and gray.

I knew, however, that because there was no specific reason behind it, that it would be gone by the next morning. At least I hoped it would; that's generally been the way it's worked for the past several years. It's a temporary brain glitch. When I was much younger, a sudden reawakening of the depression like this, with this much force, meant that it was going to be with me, day in, day out, for the next several months. Then it would go away for a week or two, then come back again for a few more months. That time in the middle was kind of like taking a vacation from work.

I was not a pleasant kid to be around most of the time between the ages of, oh, make it 13 through 24. Maybe 27.

Anyway, so it was on me again the other day. I didn't feel like talking, or writing or thinking. I fiddled about, cleaned up a few things, made a few pointless stabs at typing, then gave up. Sometimes the best and only thing to do with a grim day is to give up on it, shut it down and wait for the next one. I put on my coat and headed back to Brooklyn.

Once there, I picked up some more beer (extra beer never hurts), lit up a cigarette and headed for my apartment.

Along the way, I passed a man I recognized standing outside of a store. He said hello, and I stopped.

Although we'd only spoken on a few occasions, we'd known each other, in a way, for some time. Back in the early 90s he'd turned me down for a job I was applying for, but that was okay. It all worked out for the best, and since then we've been on friendly terms.

I wasn't much in a mood for chatting, but I stopped anyway, thinking it would be rude to just nod and walk on by.

We talked for a few minutes as I balled up as much energy as I could muster in an effort to sound "chipper." Mostly he talked about the growing dissatisfaction he felt with his latest business endeavor. I told him a few stories about the people I'd known in the same business?all of whom had eventually gone mad in one way or another. Even as I was telling these stories, I was thinking it probably wasn't the thing to be saying to a man who seemed to be close to the edge as it was.

Then, perhaps because he could smell it on me, he said, "You've had some experience with depression, right?"

"Oh, you bet I have," I told him, smirking a bit, but choosing not to go into any recent details.

"So let me ask you then?after everything, did you ever find a magic cure for it?"

I stopped myself from showing him the contents of my grocery bag, and instead reminded him that everything's cyclical.

"Best thing to keep in mind while it's there?if you can?is that it's going to go away, eventually, for whatever reason. It's not going to last. It may come back again, but it won't last then, either." I didn't know if it was what he wanted to hear, or if it was even true. All I knew was that it had been my experience. At least lately.

He thought about this for a moment.

"So what you're saying," he said, "is that I might be nearing the end of a 10-year cycle?"