I learned recently that the third Monday of January is called Blue Monday and is supposed to be the most depressing of the year. Many of us can feel more down than usual as we return to work after the festive period, especially if we also have difficult things happening in our lives already. Last week I called a friend I hadn’t spoken with in months. We had been playing phone tag and when we finally got a hold of one another naturally the first thing he asked me was “How are you?” “Fine, how are you?” was my instinctive response. It took him a little longer to reply, and as he hemmed and hawed a bit I said, somewhat jokingly: “Oh you’re going to give me a real answer.” To which he immediately said: “Of course. I haven’t got time for anything else!”
我最近了解到，1月的第三个星期一被称为“蓝色星期一”，据说是一年中最令人沮丧的一天。许多人在节日过后重返工作岗位时，可能会感到比平时更沮丧，尤其是当生活中已经有困难的事情发生时。上周，我打电话给一位几个月没联系的朋友。我们一直在互相拨打电话，终于联系上时，他自然地问我的第一句话是：“你怎么样？”我本能地回答：“很好，你呢？”他稍微迟疑了一下，支支吾吾地说，我半开玩笑地说：“哦，你要给我一个真实的答案。”他立刻回答：“当然，我没时间说别的！”