Organizers of the annual Depression 5K are struggling to motivate participants to finish because it doesn’t matter and nothing will change anyway.
While spectators along the lakefront race route encourage runners with affirmations like “You can do it!” the runners reply with sentiments like “No I can’t” and “That’s a lie; nobody likes me.”
A small number of runners on Abilify have finished at a competitive pace, but the rest have yet to complete the full 5K. The typical racer struggles through 60-meter bursts of running between longer periods of walking and brooding. Sullen and listless, they fix their eyes upon the depths of the lake at the horizon, oblivious to the purpose of the event. Because there is no purpose, and probably not a god, either. And she blocked your number seven years ago because you’re weird and not a real man.
Even last year’s champions have not been immune to the scourge of melancholy. James McKinney, the reigning men’s winner, likened tying his shoes this morning to how he felt at the start of the Iraq War, while Francis Sagalow, the sitting women’s victor, said she was consumed with shame over feeling ugly in her racing gear.
Though organizers are hoping to cultivate a positive atmosphere through uplifting messages, they’re instead finding their attendees muttering negative self-talk and questioning why they came.
In ironic fashion, the organizers are succeeding in their awareness goals but are nevertheless diminishing their own efforts and feeling they have accomplished little. They apologize that you had to hear about it in any way. They’re sorry. Will you come back again? They wouldn’t blame you if they didn’t. It was all a mistake. They’re sorry…