You know, I am beginning to hate the question “How are you doing?”

It is just one of those innocuous questions that everyone asks. They expect to hear good things. When it is not, they want to know why. Some days when I am in a bad mood, I just want to be left alone. Besides, how do you answer that question when you aren’t in a good mood?

Q: How are you doing?
A: Pretty crappy actually.

That usually doesn’t go over well. Just yesterday I was in an absolute foul mood. I have had some stupid personal problems on my mind, and they have been weighing pretty heavy on me. As a result my sleep patterns are all out of whack, and I just dont feel like myself. My friends can recognize this. A couple people asked me yesterday how I was doing, and I replied with something like “I’ve been better”. Friends being what they are immediately want to know what is wrong. I wanted to tell them about it, but at the time I couldn’t. I politely declined. It all started with a simple question to which they got an answer they weren’t expecting.

Normally I am a pretty mellow person, and not much changes. When something does change for the worse, I think that my friends just want to help me return to normal. I appreciate that, but sometimes I just want to wallow in my self pity, or whatever bad mood I am in. Sometimes I just want to be left alone. If I want help I need to learn to ask for it, not have it thrust upon me.