Year 4, Day 218: There is going to be so much disruption this week. Two tomorrow for Halloween: the kids’ school parade and then trick or treating. Two appointments on Wednesday for the kids, and PiC has a procedure that requires anesthesia Thursday so I’ll have to handle the drop off and pick up of everyone that day. Taking several deep breaths as we plunge headlong into the fray.
Underlying all this has been a gratitude for the flexibility that I have had to DO all this stuff in the first place. Unfortunately this gratitude was shattered today with news that I can’t share yet. If things go in one direction, the job as I know it, with all the stuff that makes this job good for our lives, would probably go away. It’s always been work, of course, but it has also been a set-up that let me do my best work at the least cost. Losing that would be devastating.
If my job changes substantially next year… whoof. The urges to (obsessively) go through our money to figure out what our options are and to wander the neighborhood muttering imprecations under my breath are strong. This timing is crappy. We’ve lived with slightly bated breath for more than a decade as this grew from a start-up and it was always possible for it to disappear at any time but it’s still crappy timing. We’re projected to pay back the emergency fund next August at best so that’s a small stresser. My health is improved but not enough to add a commute to our lives and work in an office again, even if I was willing to. That’s the much bigger stresser. The cost of commuting and in person work is too high. For now I don’t know anything concrete will happen so I just have to hope like hell that the economy swings things in my favor.
I’m also on my 12th sore throat for the year. I would really like my body to stop overreacting to viral infections by causing sores in my throat which is nearly as bad as getting sick.
Year 4, Day 219: We had a break with Halloween tradition this year, inviting new friends out since our usual Halloween friends were booked, and the kids had a LOT of fun. The new friends haven’t ever done it this way before and their mom predicts they’ll want to do it this way again next year. The kids were like Energizer bunnies, still bouncing to go go go after we adults were throwing in the towel. We even stayed out an hour too late and they STILL wanted to stay out later. My body wanted to have some words. Of course now I’m also going to have angst over whether our usual friends will be free and want to go out next year. I don’t mix friend groups as a rule, it gets too chaotic and it’s harder to enjoy each set of friends so we’d have to pick.
It’s spreadsheet day but after working until almost 11 pm, after walking miles for trick or treat, I simply have to push that to another day. I love spreadsheeting.
Year 4, Day 220: The world’s worst dental appointment was had today by Smol Acrobat who screamed all the way through their cleaning. I have no clue why. They’ve been eagerly anticipating this appointment for weeks and excited about all the goodies. They specifically freaked out about having to lay down for the exam and cleaning, so now we have to practice doing brushing and flossing laying down.
I plowed through my work in four hours and rewarded JB for their hours of chores and mostly staying occupied without bothering me too much with a trip to the library.
We still haven’t celebrated our wedding anniversary, so we need to decide if there’s something we actually feel up to doing. One more hectic day to survive this week, first.
Year 4, Day 221: Today was the MARATHON day of this marathon week. Drop off JB. Drop off PiC. Drop off Smol Acrobat. Go home, scarf three bites of breakfast, and turn back around. Pick up PiC. Work for a while. Pick up JB. Take them to self defense. Pick up Smol Acrobat. Pick up take out for dinner. Yell at my phone’s touchscreen for refusing to work. Make it home slightly late for the PTA meeting.
Brain: fried. Body: Extra crispy.
Year 4, Day 222: Friday food! I took another run at seafood pasta because PiC needed a low fiber diet this week and tried this recipe with shrimp, scallops, and calamari. My first try was only with the calamari using another recipe and while it was ok, it was pretty bland. Adding a lot of butter and broth turned things around nicely. I also accidentally harvested a plate of tiny potatoes while I was fertilizing the garden so that turned into a small batch of Japanese curry. Enough to feed four and have some left over. We relied on freezer food Wednesday, the Trader Joe’s Indian and Costco lasagna, which are all delicious but absolute torture on my sore throat. We’re on week two of that particular beauty. I need non-spicy foods for this throat. We tried a new Thai restaurant yesterday. It was pretty good and they had DUCK. The pad kee mao duck could have used a lot more duck but it was tasty nonetheless.
I also knocked out a few outstanding to do things: Putting out the final Lakota Families call for the year, sent the call out 2 emails, sent cards to my doctors to thank them for being supportive and attentive healthcare professionals. I pulled some special stickers to mail to a friend.
One of the school pickup grandmas was telling me that their grandkid, who has activities scheduled every afternoon and sometimes two, can be found crying over their homework some nights, probably from exhaustion. Usually this kid joshes JB about their incredibly light schedule, telling JB they need to go to more activities. Obviously our circumstances are very different. Their family has four adults, two who do work and two who don’t, in their lives to ferry them to activities. JB has me during the week. I prefer not to have PiC trying to chauffeur when he already has to handle daycare dropoff and pickup. And I work! Sometimes I feel a little twinge that I can’t be in two places at once.
Hearing that recounting made me feel a little better. Not that I’m glad he has those nights! But I feel a tiny bit better about our setting hard limits on JB’s activities. I never want to be committing my elementary school kid to that much. It’s too much. Not to mention the financial cost of private swim, tutoring, martial arts multiple times a week. I don’t want to imagine the time and money that would take.
Life with Smol Acrobat
Smol’s words are still coming in fast and thick. They’ve been struggling with pronouns. One morning they burst on the scene with “I want to hug you, Mommy!”
!!
Their mood swings are also something else right now.
We’ve had days where we couldn’t breathe without setting off a tantrum. It’s exhausting. And then after hours of this, they’re suddenly sunny and mischievous and chuckling. The joke’s on us.
Pupdate
Sera 🐶 was off her feed about two weeks this month. She’s normally a hearty efficient eater, clearing out the bowl in two minutes or less. Out of the blue she started leaving parts of her meal in the bowl. She’d eventually come back for the rest but I’ve been very concerned about whether something is actually wrong with her. I’ve been monitoring her closely, nothing else seems to be the matter except a general sluggishness on and off, but may schedule her for another physical and bloodwork. We just did that in January, but this is weird. It feels like old age set in overnight.
She had impromptu playdates with two puppies on separate occasions this month. One of them she already knew from a very young age but we hadn’t seen her for months, I wasn’t sure Sera 🐶 remembered her. The other one was a new friend that she was figuring out. They both went fairly well considering her prior history with unknown dogs. Her time with the dogsitter and pack of dogs, lots of training with us everyday, and time have all mellowed her out a lot. Age has a lot to do with it too. She’s senior enough now that the young pups are more deferential once she scolds them.
Precious Moments
After I’d made breakfast
Thank you, Mommy! And bacon! I wike bacon again. (Yesterday they did not like bacon, before they even tried any. But then they tried some and liked half of it.) Mommy, you’re yeeving soon? Going to school?
I do not think that phrase means what you think it means
Absolutely no one:
Smol Acrobat: ohhhhh DAS why
Teaching everyone to be accurate with their asks
JB: Can I have kitty?
Smol Acrobat: No.
JB: Can I BORROW kitty?
Smol Acrobat: Yes.
Smol Acrobat monologuing
Mommy daddy get timeout wif Miss Swamp! (Why? we ask) You say no! Wook at dat ting! Dat BEEEEEG ting fwying. (bug flying) Ooh, spiderweb! I scared of spiderweb. Good job, spider.
Running out of ice cream is a very emotional experience.
Smol Acrobat got a firm lesson in table manners and manners in general tonight. They looked at me after polishing off their scoop and asked, politely, can I share your ice cream? I smiled back and said, “oh that was a very good ask, but no. You still have some in your bowl.” Before I could say anything else, they FLIPPED into a full fury screech. Up to 2 months ago, before they could talk clearly, I’ve responded mildly to this reaction but they’ve been verbally communicating with much better clarity lately, so it felt like the time was right. “Oh, well, now the answer has to be no because you’re pitching a tantrum. That’s not ok. This is my ice cream and I’m not ready to share yet. If JB asks me, and I say no, what do you think they say?”
JB played along, “mommy, can I have some of your ice cream?”
Me: “No, sorry, I’m not ready to share.”
JB: “Ok! I’ll just clean my bowl some more!” *goes back to scraping every last molecule of ice cream out of the bowl*
Me: “Now, that was very polite and now I feel like sharing. So JB can have a bite of my ice cream. What if you asked me again and I still said no, should you scream and stomp?”
Smol: “No.”
Me: “Let’s try it.”
Smol: “Mommy, can I share some of your ice cream peeess?”
Me: “No, I’m not ready to share yet. Do you stomp and scream now?”
Smol: “No.”
Me: “What do you say?”
Smol: Say “ok”?
Me: “That’s right! Smol, do you want me to help you scrape your bowl to get all your ice cream out like JB is doing?”
Smol: “Ys. Peess.” (please)
Me: “Good job practicing better manners! Now I feel like sharing, you may have a bite.”
Smol: *Chomp* “Thank you. Daddy! I shared ice cream wif mommy!”
Size matters
Me: Can you get your soap?
Smol: No, I can’t reach it up dere. I have to do DIS. *reaches* I’m too small. Can you get it for me?
Year 4, Day 192: It’s early release all week long. My already short interruption-free parts of the days are now even shorter. But in a stroke of luck, I found a cursive book on sale a few weeks ago and had tucked it away, it’s perfect for this week. JB was thrilled to get it. That’s got to be good for about three days of preoccupation, at a guess. Possibly four.
Year 4, Day 193: Smol woke up at 1 am crying for a hug and asking to go to the big bed. I hugged them until they were willing to lay back down in their own bed. Then I went back to bed where I was completely unable to go back to sleep because my bones flared up something fierce. Painsomnia, everyone’s best friend!
The silver lining to the brain fog was when I caught my brain trying to float away on a cloud of fatigue, instead of being mean to myself and scrunching my shoulders to my ears, I let it float until I could corral it gently back to task. I still got all the things done. Even if it wasn’t at the pace I’d normally set, it was without making the pain and fatigue worse by adding extra stress. I’m learning!
Well, mostly not. It’s so like my body to withhold honest feedback until evening and then run me over with the semitruck of pain and fatigue as soon as I put dinner on the table. I almost crashed but bucked myself up with the thought of cake for dessert. Naturally that’s when Smol Acrobat decided to revert to their “I can’t possibly transport a spoon from the bowl to my mouth, that’s an absurd expectation” mode and refused to eat with their own limbs. I dislike this mode.
They did not get cake.
Year 4, Day 194: The jokes were all on me today. I decided it was going to be a cozy sweats and stay at home (working, of course but no activities) day. Then I walked out and it was pushing 80 degrees. Oh. Right. Heat wave today. And then I saw the calendar and remembered that I have an in person meeting AND an appointment to take JB to the ortho this afternoon. Triple fail. 😅
Bonus fail: the ortho scheduler / office manager was incompetent and only scheduled one of the two appointments we needed for this stage of treatment so I was very unthrilled to add a second appointment to my week next week. I would have scheduled next week differently had I known. She and I are not friends. At our last appointment, she overcharged for our treatment plan claiming that she agreed to honor the quote but not the discounts in the quote. That is PART OF THE QUOTE. Ahem. I don’t appreciate dishonesty and I don’t appreciate overpaying.
But my blueberry bush arrived early! That was very exciting. JB helped me unpack and it’s very pretty. It’s compact, expected to top out at 1-2 feet tall and wide which is just the right size for our yard.
Also, I scored a really big win for myself and some of my team this week and I’d been puffed up with the joy of sharing their good news all day. It wasn’t until evening that I realized I’d forgotten to be happy about my part! Good job, me.
Year 4, Day 195: Heat wave cons: so hot, oh so hot. Sunburns. Sunblock runs into eyes when you sweat it off. The pavement gets too hot for Sera’s 🐶 feet so we have to be quick about walks. Emergency chocolate in my bag melts into a squishy lump. Legs stick to leather car seats. Dizziness strikes hard, at random. Half this household does NOT handle heat well.
Heat wave pros: dishes dry really fast. We can line dry clothes (usually it’s too damp so they mold. yuck.) At night, the sky is beautifully clear and the stars are visible. The morning chill is pleasantly crisp, sitting on the skin, not biting bone deep.
Year 4, Day 196: Friday food review! I made quick panko chicken on the fly one night, served with rice and creamed spinach from the freezer. Then I made a chicken, tofu, and broccoli stir fry kind of thing using up the leftover packets of Korean BBQ style marinade from the Kevin’s meal kits. That was so big we had leftovers for a second dinner and small lunch. The hottest day this week was designated “have someone else cook today”: chicken and waffles takeout! Supporting a small local business and delicious food = happy.
Our local Kaiser finally got their COVID vaccine supply in today so we tried our luck and now both adults are vaccinated! We have to set appointments for the kids to have theirs administered by the pediatrician, so now I have to stalk those appointments. Will report back on how we feel post-vax, the initial jab was pleasantly “small needle” feeling like our flu vaccines were, and no immediate effects were felt.
Year 4, Day 164: I only labored a little this Labor Day, and that was just to marginally make up for some time I’ll need to be away from my desk tomorrow.
I have had it up to here with cajoling Smol Acrobat to eat their dinner night after night after endless frustrating hair-rending night. I declared that their choice was clear: finish eating their meal, and join the rest of us in a bowl of ice cream, or don’t, and don’t.
PiC wasn’t sure I meant it until I sent JB to the freezer to bring out the tub. Yup. I meant business. I started eating my ice cream right in front of them. They’ve never cleared a plate of regular non-dessert food (safely, no worries, they weren’t THAT motivated) so fast on their own.
All I want for my birthday is not to spend another night trying to get this child to eat their dang dinner. You’d think we were trying to poison them the way they avoid eating until we come up with sufficient motivation.
Year 4, Day 165: All three packages arrived today, ahead of schedule: my medication, Sera’s 🐶 meds and treats, and my binders. It’s satisfying to get them all squared away on a Tuesday because the boxes can go out with the Wednesday recycling. It’s such a little thing to be happy about.
Year 4, Day 166: Roller coaster day. This morning, I contacted the superintendent’s office since the principal never bothered to acknowledge our email, much less engage in meaningful conversation.
The assistant confirmed receipt quickly, then it was just as quickly passed over to the Director of Student Safety, who dumped it back in the lap of the principal for an in-person meeting. You know, the one who ignored the email to begin with.
I shouldn’t be surprised, just like I wasn’t surprised that she refused to offer any constructive feedback on the situation in the first place, but it still felt like a punch in the gut. It felt like it was my failure to be effective. I did my best to lay out the situation as we saw it and open a dialogue. Instead, we get passed around like a hot potato that no one wants to deal with. And somehow it feels like MY failure. PiC says that it’s good that it’s now all documented. I suppose that’s looking at the marginally less dark side of things. We wouldn’t even BE here if they had bothered to respond to my email like they should have done in the first place. Or if they gave two hoots about student safety. They keep acting like we’re trying to punish the other kid. We have no interest in the other kid. We only want to stop the behavior before it gets completely out of hand.
Year 4, Day 167: I keep wondering why I’m so behind this week and then I open this post and realize oh, that’s right. We had one day off and though I cleared my desk on Friday, I’m still burning the midnight oil trying to get caught up and not making enough of a dent. So that’s depressing. But! The good news on the work side is we will be able to train more staff soon, ahead of need for once, because I had a brilliant plan and now all it needs is a brilliant execution to make sure that my team has good backup. So there is that.
On the personal side, I’ve been having all kinds of awful feelings of failure about the bully situation. While mulling over all the things I don’t know about this situation, I stopped by JB’s former teacher’s classroom to ask for her thoughts. She was very forthcoming about the things I asked, and then asked to speak to JB for a bit. She very kindly reassured JB that they have every right to defend themselves if this kid comes at them again, and that they wouldn’t be in trouble for that. I don’t know how they didn’t inherit my “touch me and I’ll pop you” gene but they’re more worried about getting in trouble than they are about protecting themselves. That accounts for at least half my feelings of failure. The other half is probably emotional backlash from seeing responsible adults at the school abdicate their responsibilities to keep JB safe. I didn’t spot that one, genius Jaydot did.
A line from Suits that stuck with me: “for all his faults, he would take a bullet before he would let anything happen to his little girl.” A whole lot of us are in the (We have/had a) Crappy Parent Club. Suffice to say my dad wouldn’t take a bent nail for me and I didn’t know how deeply that would undermine how I parent and how I feel about parenting.
Year 4, Day 168: Friday food review! I threw together a baked salmon, rice, and (frozen) broccoli dinner one night. I picked up a Thai feast the other night. PiC added my fresh dug potatoes from the garden (er, the potato growing bag), to a premade chicken curry from Costco one night. That’s the one dish that was popular with Smol Acrobat. Just enough for them to ask for some more than once but not eat all of it all the time. I can’t wait until they outgrow this distracted eating phase.
It’s felt like pulling teeth to get food on the table this week. I think I’m overwhelmed from juggling all the things.
Year 4, Day 157: My money nerd self soothing involves looking at our dividend income and figuring out how much of our bills we can pay with it. Right now the monthly average is about $300 so. That covers the water/sewer every other month, and the electric/gas bill, and 1/12 of the property tax. That’s not going so far.
I bought Costco stock in 2013 when it was around $120/share and that was expensive for my cash flow. If you’d told me back then that it would be quadruple in price in ten years, I wouldn’t have believed you. But I might have scraped together the cash to buy ten or twenty more shares just in case. I wish I had. The next time I bought was in 2021 at $360/share and I would have sworn that was the peak. It’s around $530 now so I clearly know nothing. Of course my incredulity that it’s $530 feels the same as I felt when it was $120/share and $360/share.
Year 4, Day 158: I’ve enjoyed having our potato growing sacks so much, especially because they don’t really need much tending day to day, that I’ve been strongly tempted to venture into berries. Blueberries and/or blackberries. Our friends a few miles away who actually get sun have fantastically producing bushes and as I type this I realize that sun could be the reason they have such a great garden. Am I going to be wasting our money on bushes? I recall reading that you need two buy two bushes for cross pollination of the blueberries, I wonder if that’s the same for blackberries. We’ll also need to put netting over them. Our friends didn’t in their first year and lost almost their entire harvest to the birds.
Year 4, Day 159: I am unsurprised to see that on Day 3 post-email, the principal still hasn’t acknowledged receipt or responded in any way. I’m giving myself the week to catch up on rest and work and then next week, when she still won’t have responded, I’ll wade back into this and escalate.
This is my week of sleeplessness. One night it’s because the pain just won’t fade enough for me to sleep. The next night it’s Smol Acrobat waking up multiple times crying and needing soothing back to sleep. The next, insomnia again. Maybe this is my body’s way of saying “you only think you’re relaxing!”
Year 4, Day 160: A month ago we surprised ourselves by buying the new car that came available rather unexpectedly. The expected result was that we needed to downsize by selling our now-extraneous third car. It makes sense. There’s no room in the garage for three cars. There’s barely room in there for two. The decluttering part of me wanted it gone the week after the new car came home but we’ve been really busy so I’ve just maneuvered as best I could and he cleared as much detritus that built up in the garage as he could. We coped. PiC finally found time last weekend to prepare the ad and now he’s getting replies. My I can’t wait to have that space cleared impatience was replaced with sadness the second the ad replies started to come in.
That was the car we brought Sera and Smol Acrobat home in. That was the car we took the whole family, including Seamus and Sera, on trips in. And that was the car we took Seamus for his last ride in.
Finally letting go of it feels really sad. But as a reminder, I can’t trust the trunk lid to stay up properly which is really irritating so I’ll try to balance the nostalgia with the stuff I won’t miss.
Year 4, Day 161: This makes six days this week I’ve not gotten four hours of sleep any night. I’m too tired to exist.
Friday food review! We had a Trader Joe’s frozen meals medley one night. Thank goodness the food is decent quality or that meal would have been really sad. We tried Jollibee for the first time. JB loved the burgersteak and Smol Acrobat loved the fried chicken, that was the opposite result from what I expected. JB loved the peach mango pie as expected and Smol didn’t like it, less of a surprise. Adults were fine with all of it. We had two leftovers nights and one sushi (big treat!) night. Feeding one kid who mostly loves everything (and therefore wants my sashimi) and one kid who dislikes mostly everything (and therefore only picks at every possible option) is becoming extra annoying when I have to spend special treat nights trying to find one thing Smol Acrobat can eat enough of to qualify as a sufficient calorie meal.
I know I said I’d give myself a week to rest before wading back into the fight but Monday is a holiday which means I felt like I needed to get a jump on drafting my email to the superintendent.
I understand why I felt that way but it was a terrible decision.
That was an awful way to close out the week, of course, leaving me irritable and angsty about the upcoming confrontation.
Year 4, Day 115: A friend is celebrating a big decade birthday and commented well, at this age, they’re all big aren’t they. Better than the alternative, anyway. On an almost related note, I hate that a favorite author is fighting cancer but she also tells the best stories during treatment and it’s hard not to appreciate these Twitter threads (I very much recommend the Clocktaur Wars duo and her Paladin series having just re-read them):
Year 3, Day 116: I actually remembered to put sunblock on before taking the kids to the park but still got sunburned. Unfair!
At least I won’t need an extra blanket and heating pad tonight?
This wracking cough is still plaguing me morning and night. Sometimes midday, but less often. I feel less horrible than last week but still frustrated at being sick for so long. I’m grateful that my doctor prescribed both heavy duty cough meds that I requested without question. We’re super fortunate to have good healthcare providers right now and hate that everyone doesn’t have equal access to care like we have.
Oh, speaking of doctors, I’ll have to see a dermatologist about this lump that mysteriously appeared in 2020 when I had no time to care about anything not dire. At the time, I assumed it was a weird body acne thing that would run its course but here we are, 3 years later and it feels like time to name it or get rid of it. The consultation will be about (I hope) removing it. I also hope it’ll be a simple procedure.
I am genuinely puzzled why society continues to expect less from cishet men than trained pets. None of this strikes me as funny. It’s more like she’s laughing because otherwise she’d have to cry about how useless he is.
This lady shared 5 dumb things her husband did when she was in labor. I helped translate. pic.twitter.com/Wcq46m1YVC
Year 3, Day 117: Overhearing an acquaintance talking about her writing process, I couldn’t help but think about all the writers I currently admire, the stories and characters they’ve devised that I love, and what sort of styles they’re known for.
Just off the top of my head: Neil Gaiman, Terry Pratchett, Ursula Vernon, DJ Older, Nnedi Okarafor, NK Jemisin, Fonda Lee, Seanan McGuire, Kate Elliott, KB Spangler, Nghi Vo, Cassandra Khaw.
In my 20s, I dreamed of being able to write books/something that people would enjoy reading but had no faith I’d ever have the skill. My former English teacher always reminded me that Amy Tan didn’t write The Joy Luck Club until her late 30s, there was plenty of time. Some years on, having developed a bit of a mentor-mentee relationship with a very established writer, I asked this writer to read a post I’d written here for feedback. His feedback was insightful but I didn’t have the chops to properly address it. Maybe it’s worth revisiting, it’s been over a decade since I first wrote it, but now in my early 40s (and I know that old saw “it’s not too late until you’re dead”) it feels like if I was capable of writing something worth reading, or had an idea worth the time, that compulsion would have happened by now. Not to compare myself to Terry Pratchett in terms of skill, but in terms of that drive to write, this anecdote feels like evidence I just don’t have it in me. It doesn’t feel like I’ve got anything worth saying that needs my voice to say it.
Umberto Eco said: I wrote a novel because I had a yen to do it. I believe this is sufficient reason to set out to tell a story.
Maybe my yen is faded. Perhaps it’s time to put that dream to bed instead of continuing to feel vaguely dissatisfied with myself for not accomplishing anything. Because if we’re honest, I haven’t found a way to squeeze out extra hours in a day to spend on writing, and no one (who isn’t, say, Terry Pratchett) gets better at writing without a lot of practice, focus, and good feedback.
And entirely aside from that, the author stories from the trenches of having to market their books nonstop is utterly depressing. I’m terrible at marketing.
Terry Pratchett once rang up a friend and said, “I’m exhausted! I need a break. I’m taking a six-month sabbatical.”
Six months later his friend asked him, “Hey, how’d your sabbatical go?”
Terry said, grumpily, “I wrote two books.”
— Owl! at the Library 😴🧙♀️ (@SketchesbyBoze) July 19, 2023
Year 3, Day 118: There’s almost something laughable about elderly relatives accusing us of being overly indulgent and permissive with Smol Acrobat, while complete strangers comment that they are well behaved in public (timing is everything). We’re tired, and we are trying to gentle parent, but we’re neither indulgent or permissive when it comes to the important things. Some folks just aren’t happy unless they’re dousing other people with their unhappiness and can’t feel good about themselves without insulting someone else. Must be sad to be them.
Separately: I was lucky enough to have a long heart to heart with a chosen parent about all kinds of family history including abusive parent figures and how we’ve coped with it. We’re fundamentally such different people and we have very different coping mentalities, and I’m so grateful to have found a parent in them.
Naturally, my gut couldn’t accept that they like me for me. No matter who it is, some part of my brain starts second-guessing why they put up with me. The imprints in my psyche after years of knowing that half my family of origin had no love for me, but not understanding why, keep floating to the surface. Who am I to deserve love? Nobody, that’s who.
I keep reminding myself it’ll take time to erase those marks.
Year 3, Day 119: It’s been a busy week. Mostly good, some bad, but having support from my chosen family so that I could steal a few moments without having to mind them constantly has been unbelievably amazing. I miss my community, I miss my chosen family, and it’s been pure joy to see Smol Acrobat bond deeply with Grandma. They’re far more selective about who they’re close with, whereas JB was expansive, and so this is the first time I’m seeing them really invested in a relationship with another person outside of our nuclear family.
How do you think you’ll be remembered? How do you want to be remembered?
I was thinking about this four years ago and shelved it. It’s hovered in the back of my mind as I take notes for my elder friends I will have to write obituaries for.
It bubbled back up after a recent therapy session: What would people say about you at your funeral? What do people think of you as a person? What do YOU think of you?
It’s always made me wonder if people know how they’d be eulogized. What would be the summary of their existence?
I buried this post because I wasn’t ready for that level of introspection. I’m probably still not, given my reaction to similar questions in therapy (I make it a point NOT to think about that!)
Back in 2017….
I’ve kept JB alive for going on three years but that’s a reasonably human accomplishment. Besides, after the first year, that’s less of a hazard pay situation and more of a fight the toddler’s instinct to self destruct. Our home was the result of a lot of hard work but survival isn’t a true achievement. (Well, it is, but not in this context.)
My soul is searching for learning and doing. My brain is craving newthings to read and do. BUT. My body says no. It is succumbing to fjaka. Weariness weighs down my limbs, lava boils my joints (metaphorically but I also feel it literally), and no amount of metaphorical browbeating can get them to buck up unless and until they’re ready.
My brain craves a hit of accomplishment dopamine very regularly, was satisfied by the tangible completion of the house renovation weekly, and now that I’m off that particular hook, I’m in serious withdrawal. For someone who usually believes she can do anything, being in an “idle” refortification phase of life feels both strange and sometimes deleterious.
Now in 2023….
With the addition of Smol Acrobat, I still feel like my achievement wheels are spinning in mud. I don’t know what matters for me.
I did pick up sewing which has been an incredibly painful, though satisfying, hobby, when I finally figure out how to do something new. I’ve learned how to attach zippers and sew packing cubes and I’ve repaired (sort of) my longtime travel backpack.
I still measure my successes in the tiniest of measuring cups: did we feed everyone with a minimum of stress this week? Did we make it to each commitment on time this week? (Usually) Did we help out a Lakota family this month? (Usually) Did we send a birthday card on time? (Sometimes)
How would you want to be remembered?
My hope is that I’ll be missed, that I meant enough to someone for my absence to matter. I hope I’ll have helped people.
Year 4 of COVID in the Bay Area.
