Spring Break

Early warning that this post is a bit of wallowing. More so than any blog. But, no on reads this and it felt good to type out.

I cried for the first time this past week. And I mean break down, wtf, overwhelmed crying. The last time I did that it was August of 2018 and the sheer stress of the back to school rush (I work at a school and manage everything not related to curriculum/behavior) PLUS my son starting kindergarten was a knife to the heart.

I mean I teared up in Spiderverse (if you see any earlier blog posts) and sometimes I watch the last 3 minutes of G7 of the 2016 NBA Finals to get a nice heart murmur.

But this was crying.

It's spring break and I had my son all week, save for one day. And I love my son but he has not yet honed the ability to entertain himself, barring YouTube.

And I was sick with a wonky fever-cold that went on 5 days.

Then I can't sleep past 3am. I will wake up at 3am and then lie on the couch beating anxiety with endless scroll. Im up so I should work, knock out some emails. But, I'm exhausted, so let's try to go back to sleep. Oh, but here is a YouTube video I have not seen. I should read and stop wasting time online. I used to read so much. Then at 5am I am spent and dizzy tired/wired and a kid gets up.

The one day I went to the office I bounced around with contractors and paper pushing. Its helpful when no one is in the office but I take no long term satisfaction in what I get done. Its all regrets and I should

I should clean the office fridge.
I should tell the landlord to go fuck themselves.
I should do the math one nore time on those budget projections.
I should clean the milk fridge.
I should scrape and paint this hallway.
I should update the data on our staff compliance tracker.
I should bug infinite vendors.

And this is still doing an hour or two from home every evening

Then my daughter got sick and I had a sick toddler, my son, and me for 2 whole days. Being a daddy hurts my bones. I lose my patience and scream at them. I can't tie my daughter's hair back into even a simple pony tail because fine motor skills always evade me.

Then the New Zealand attacks happened and that is when I just cried. Which made me feel dumb (How is this different from any other tragedy or violence at which you have not bawled) then angry (at myself for the moral relativism, then at the attackers, then at myself again for being powerless to do anything) and then just drained.

I reported people who RT the live stream of the attack. What in the ever loving fuck would you do that? How awful when cruelty is so clever and effective.

Then I wanted to not be idle. I donated money to a Muslim American charity I worked with in another job. I would talk to my kids about what they see on YouTube. Nvm my kids can't really read. I would swipe away all the zany suggestions that can take a sudden turn down the rabbit hole. "Not interested" for days. I would go to the gym and get in shape. Maybe because sometimes the world does feel like is is fraying I will see if I take up a buddy on taking me to the shooting range. I should try it before criticizing, yes?

But then I'm raging again because I will likely stay the same tired fat guy lucky, however self-aware. to be born a male able to code switch into the majority. Then sad and angry I am making this about myself (blogging about it!) instead of those 50 victims. And shouldn't I felt like this for other victims? Yemen war victims. The Pittsburgh victims. Charlottesville.  What is wrong with me?!

So I cried because I felt if anything deserved tears it would be this.