Are beginnings always scary? Are endings always depressing? And is Sunday at the beginning of the week, or at the end? Either way, I’m sad. Each Sunday afternoon I seem to enter some kind of downward spiral — a pit of despair, a snake eating its tail. Sundays are the days I bite my nails the most.

“I think U need to localize UR sadness,” said my mother in a text message. “Do U want me to Venmo some money for Arethusa?” After chugging a coffee milk, sponsored by my mom, I sat and brooded over my sadness. She was right. I needed to find the source. I would trace a path until I understood what it really was that was ruining my week. But of course, as it was Sunday, I could not devote my full attention to this task — I also needed to catch up on the work I neglected over the weekend.

I began to read Allen Ginsberg’s “America” for my poetry class. And then I started to think: Am I sad because of America? Are our libraries full of tears, like he said? According to the Gun Violence Archive dating back to July 2014, Sundays are considered the deadliest day of the week. In 20 out of 50 states, the most gun deaths occurred on a Sunday. One of these states was Connecticut.

Which made me start to think, am I sad because of Connecticut? I’m a Stamford native and I’ve been sad probably every Sunday of my life. I did some googling: Back in 1781, sets of “blue laws” were published in the colony of Connecticut. According to these laws, you weren’t allowed to kiss your baby on Sundays. You weren’t allowed to play music. You couldn’t even tell a joke. No wonder I’m so sad! A hatred of Sundays has been ingrained into my New England tradition, passed down for generations until it hit me, an innocent girl who found herself ensnared in the conspiratorial, depressive scheme of The Nutmeg State.

And then the worst thought of all began to creep over me. I wasn’t being precise enough; perhaps I needed to localize even further. Am I sad because of Yale? I scrolled frantically through the Instagram account Sad Yale Boys (@sadyaleboys), only to discover that 41 of their 150 posts were uploaded on a Sunday. Almost a third! I was horrified. Sadness had been all around me, all this time! I had to blame Yalies for bumming me out so hardcore.

I was in denial. This couldn’t be possible. Yale is supposed to be Perfect. No one here could ever be sad. Do you ever see people crying in public at Yale? Never. Crazy. Maybe only sometimes in Haas you see people curled up in those womb chairs, yearning for primordial existence. But that’s an exception. Those are architecture students.

I was losing it — down the Sunday spiral I went. I needed to snap out of it. I decided to take a break from work and go to dinner. And then I realized — it was family night. I saw all the off-campus dwellers looking so happy to receive their free meals. Stiles was even serving hot fudge that day. I realized that no, Yale couldn’t possibly be the source of sadness. How could it be when our institution was implementing precise efforts to beat off the Sunday Blues — giving us hot fudge for FREE?

I got some fudge in a cup (to go) and went back to my room. I needed to be alone; I was completely despondent. Was I the only one struck by the blues? If it wasn’t Yale that was getting me down, maybe I needed to localize even further. Was this sadness inside myself? I started to text everyone I knew. “Sunday Blues are real, right? I’m not crazy? I’m not living in some kind of hologram?!”

I started to doze off before I received any responses. Maybe the Sunday scaries were all in my head. Maybe none of it was real.

I woke up the next morning to the sound of my alarm. I forgot I had a 9 a.m. “Jeez, Mondays are the worst,” I said aloud, to nobody.