Day 18.
I was late to my first day back at work. I went to bed with a tight chest, some sort of heartache, and managed to turn off both alarms in my sleep. I might not have made it at all if it weren’t for David coming by to walk with me and not giving up after one knock (or eight).
I was in the middle of a dream where I was hanging out with some kids from my old neighborhood when one of their mothers decided to remedy my obvious brokenness by performing open-heart surgery in her living room. She sewed me back up afterwards but I was heavily sedated and couldn’t figure out what was going on or if i cared. But somehow through David’s grace and persistence, I got it together and got my butt to work.
It was approximately seven times shittier than I expected it to be. I have a desk job I enjoy that isn’t too high-pressure and I like my coworkers, so I naively thought that today could be an easy, quiet one. Not so!
My favorite interaction of the day was with one particular coworker, and it went a little something like this:
C: So, back from vacation? Har har.
M: It wasn’t a vacation.
C: Huh?
M: It wasn’t a vacation. My dad died.
C: Oooo. So I suppose that was an expected thing?
M: No. not at all. It was completely unexpected.
C: Well, you look like you’re doing ok with it.
M: yeah bye.
If you, dear reader, are the person who supplied these delightful nuggets of conversation, i’m sorry you had to find out this way that i think it’s noteworthy how much of an ass you are. My favorite part was how i was supposed to take solace in an expected passing, like “wooo! thank god my dad suffered with pancreatic cancer for two years, imagine how horrible it would be if he died completely out of the blue.” Putting aside that he did die completely out of the blue, what the fuck.
So today was the hardest yet, but I think that’s acceptable because it’s also been the biggest departure from recent routines. And despite having the worst morning possible, this evening was salvaged with a field trip to Trader Joe’s (my first time…the fruits! the cheap stuffed grape leaves! the canned lychee! the samples!) so life is not all bad. I have hope for tomorrow, and am going to go to bed now so that I wake up for it.
(oh, i added a couple new pictures from michigan to flickr too. putting old ones up soon)