GARDENING MAGAZINES CAN LEAD TO DEPRESSION IN HIGH COUNTRY

High Altitude Blues

(Silverton) Reading gardening magazines this time of the year can lead to serious depression according to a local psychologist. People who habitually peruse these glossy periodicals run the risk of embracing serious doldrums after looking at pictures of colorful flowers and green grass, then glancing outside at snow.

“The safest way to handle this potential problem is to wait until about May or even June to examine these magazines,” said Dr. Efram Bigbonne, a local circuit shrink whose practice spans an area from Lizard Head Pass to Maher. “Every year, despite our frank warnings, we treat more and more people for this malady.”

Bigbonne says that the condition often surfaces as early as January, after the first whisp of warm weather descends on the area.

“These spectacular days are nothing but teasers, as most of us know,” he said, “but somehow our subconscious convinces us that winter is over and summer is on the way. This is dangerous ground on which to proceed, even if it’s beginning to thaw out.”

The doctor suggests that gardening enthusiasts pull the drapes and stay inside if they feel compelled to expose themselves to these drastic contrasts. He adds that the practice of sending more chronic cases to the Amazon for a month has worked in the past but that newer, more potent and drug-resistant cases of the blues have began surfacing a few years ago.

“Geographical therapy is less and less effective. This depressed state is not good for other people who have to deal with these victims on a day to day basis either. It affects entire communities. If the truth be known, I prefer that my clients stick to snowmobile and skiing magazines until at least the Fourth of July .”

– Princess Irm Peawitt