Killing the (Sunday) blues

God wants you to have fun

Photo by Planet Volumes on Unsplash

Somebody said they saw me
Swinging the world by the tail
Bouncing over a white cloud
Killing the blues
—Rowland Salley, “Killing the Blues”

Remember the old Volkswagen campaign, “Fahrvergnügen?” The term was derived from the German fahren (“to drive”) and vergnügen (“pleasure”) to mean “driving pleasure.” To paraphrase Steve Martin’s famous line about the French language, those Germans have a different word for everything.

Among my favorite German neologisms is luftfahrtorigaminiedergeshlagenheit,* the word for the letdown one experiences when your carefully folded paper airplane plummets straight to the floor upon release. Sigh.

More germane to today’s topic, there is even a word for the universal sense of ennui many of us experience as the Sunday clock runs down and the work week approaches: sonntagsleerung (zohn-tahgs – leh-roong). The word means Sunday afternoon depression—literally, “Sunday-emptying.”

I suspect many of us experience sonntagsleerung. I’m not immune to it, although nowadays Sundays are often working days because I’m in the pulpit, preaching. A minister’s workweek typically stretches from Tuesday through Sunday; ministers and hairdressers take Mondays off.

Perhaps because I spent years in the Monday through Friday world as a medical writer, though, I still sometimes experience that Sunday-to-Monday dread. An informal survey of the voices inside my head confirms that a majority of the 7.8 billion other people on the planet feel the same way.

Well, we can’t have that. Because that is not what the universe intended for us. I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but most of what’s out there in the heavens consists of round objects floating—maybe rotating, maybe revolving around a star like we are—but floating at a particular stellar address, literally, just hanging out. And not worrying overmuch about anything else.

Think of all the stars and planets we can see, whether with the naked eye at night or through breathtaking images sent back from the Hubble Telescope and now the James Webb Telescope, as free-floating familiars who merely want us to be members of the same intergalactic free-floating club. Sounds spacey, I know. But if you accept that everything in reality, including us, emanated from the Big Bang or something like it, those stars and planets and entire galaxies are merely cousins. You and I just happen to have organs and limbs.  We are all just here, either by accident or by design. And we were not meant to fret so much, because, well, Jupiter doesn’t.

We all grew up learning that Jupiter is mostly gas. In fact it is made of helium and hydrogen, mostly liquid hydrogen, which accounts for it having the largest ocean in our solar system. And it is massive beyond our ken: According to NASA, if Earth were a nickel, Jupiter would be a basketball. But Jupiter doesn’t worry about being overweight or poisonous to human life or sinking a 3-pointer. Jupiter goes on being Jupiter. Jupiter doesn’t worry about offending other, more hospitable planets. Jupiter doesn’t feel bad that it erupted and spouted poisonous gas into the ether yesterday. Jupiter just is.

And we, close relations of Jupiter that we are, ought to follow suit.

“People don’t live or die, people just float.”—Bob Dylan, “Man in the Long Black Coat”

So hang out and have some fun today. You were meant to. It is a step toward wholeness and away from the sturm und drang that comes from worrying about whether one is happy. A recent piece on National Public Radio about how to have more fun quoted psychologist Mike Rucker making the case that pursuit of fun experiences may be even more valuable than seeking the sometimes abstract goal of happiness. "Happiness is a state of mind," Rucker writes. "But fun is something you can do. It doesn't require education, money or power. All it requires is intentionality."

What might you do today to chase away Sunday afternoon-emptying? You have endless choices, but a few that immediately come to mind:

Go for a pleasure drive with the intention to notice your surroundings and appreciate what’s around you. Don’t worry about achieving Fahrvergnügen. Focus on the gestalt. Try to spot something you’ve never noticed before.

Watch an old Steve Martin comedy routine. If you’re brave, seek out footage of his early career as a magician with the stage name Flydini. (You’ve been warned.) Or simply watch a funny movie, a favorite or something you’ve been meaning to get to.

Fold and fly paper airplanes. A quick search uncovered Fold ‘NFly, which offers step-by-step instructions, instructional videos and printable templates. May you experience the very opposite of luftfahrtorigaminiedergeshlagenheit and see your efforts soar.

Watch some magic, of course. Check out some of today’s finest magicians on Penn & Teller’s “Fool Us.” (Two of my favorites: Asi Wind and Dani DaOrtiz.) Or you can watch little old me perform ye olde Three Card Monte. Then contact me for a free lesson on how to do card tricks. I’ll meet you on Zoom.

View the night sky tonight. Jupiter is very bright in the west, with Venus also bright and right below it. (Jupiter won’t mind in the least if you stare.)

Gather some friends and share your best (or worst) Bob Dylan impressions. Remember that cool knows no age, and please be respectful.

And these are just the ideas generated by this post. I’m sure you can think of others; consider leaving suggestions in the comments section for others’ benefit if you’re reading this online. The bottom line is not to wait for Sunday to turn into Monday without your say-so. Short-circuit Sunday afternoon depression with a side trip to serendipity. It just might keep sonntagsleerung at bay.

~

*Pronounced looft-fahrt – oh-ree-gah-me – nee-der-ghe-shla-ghen-hite, if you’re interested, courtesy of Ben Schott’s wonderful book, Schotttenfreude: German Words for the Human Condition.