I Can Do Anything You Can Do Better

Ah, the competitive spirit.  It's what brought dogs to space and men to the moon and simultaneously threatened Americans with potential nuclear fallout for decades on end.

Much like sword-fighting of old, competition seems to come with a double edge.  On the one hand, it can give one's rear a good, swift kick in the right direction.  On the other hand, it tends toward dysfunction on too many occasions.  It doesn't take much to have too much.

Take, for instance, our friends, the Russian government.  Okay, so they're not really our friends, and they probably never were.  We only joined up with them during the second world war because, well, it was a world war, and we needed them to win.  And it worked well for us until they took over Eastern Europe and pointed nukes at us from Cuba and, you know, not great things like that.  Eventually, the wall fell and the Soviet Union dissolved, and there was a period of time under Boris Yeltsin where Russia and America didn't hate each other, and young Americans such as myself didn't associate Russia with bomb shelters and spies and bad people.  But then Putin showed up, and much in the way of fashion, "retro" is back in, and Russia and America hate each other once more.

What will be the unintended benefit this time around?  Unexpected strides in cybersecurity?  Explosive growth in alternative energy?  Russia pays for a wall all the way around the United States, and Mexico is off the hook?


Thursday night, as I sat at my parents' dining room table (unbeknownst to me, breathing in germs that would later lay me up for 36 hours), my cough-weary mother recounted a conversation she'd just had with my aunt last week about learning styles.  They'd been discussing my cousin's schoolwork and homework habits, and in so doing, she'd shared my siblings' learning quirks: one of us would read incessantly and was able to teach himself things well, another learned through song and dance and stories, another would only read if she could do so in a tree she'd climbed, and so on.

"I told your Aunt Liz, you became good at so many things because you were so competitive.  The minute someone else learned how to do something, you wanted to be good at it, too."

She's totally right.  I stuck with piano for as long as I did because I wanted to be the best musician in the family.  I started singing because my sister did.  As much as I used to dislike reading, I read one thousand pages in one month in fifth grade because we had to set a reading goal and MINE WAS GOING TO BE THE BEST.

Of my immediate family, I probably had the highest GPA in high school and the best SAT score (though not by much).  If it weren't for NOCCA (my creative writing program) and its subjective grading system's disqualifying impact, I might have been part of the Top 10 in my regular high school class (then again, freshman geometry might've kept me out first).

Of course, of my family, I probably hated high school the most and had the least amount of fun.  I used to wake up, spend nine hours at school, spend five hours doing homework, watch an hour of "Whose Line is it, Anyway?" (so I didn't spontaneously combust from the stress), sleep for seven hours, and then start all over again.  Give or take some time sobbing into my mother's shoulder.

Sometimes, being the best sucks the worst.

In the years since high school, my competitiveness has tempered.  In college, I let myself go a little, and I learned what a social life was, and by the time graduation rolled around, I was a bonefied 3.89 GPA slacker.  (So, I'm slow to change--sue me.)  Once I got past my first year of teaching, though, I'd unwound considerably.  My goal was no longer to be the best at just school or work, it was to be good at living well, too.

Then again, competition dies hard.  It's led me to learn and know a lot of stuff, and in so doing, to become somewhat neurotic about "truth."  And that makes things sticky in a world where clear cut truth is hard to find.  Honestly, being a massive goofball is probably my saving grace as a human being.  Were I not like those adorable puppies that trip over their own ears, people might realize how obnoxious and unflattering it is that I pee all over the floor and chew your shoes.  Do I know the year that the Berlin Wall fell?  Yes (it's 1989).  If someone else gives an incorrect date, do I have to correct them?  Probably not (but it will eat me up inside until I tell someone else about it later).

In trying to offset my own inflexible and sometimes judgmental behavior, I can swing too far in the opposite direction, opting for indifference or aimlessness over the hard line.  But there must be another way.  It must be possible to believe something to be the truth, and be open to the idea that there's another side to the matter.  It must be possible to be only okay (or really quite bad) at something and want to be better without needing to be the best.  It must be possible to care just the right amount: enough to cherish old knowledge, enough to seek new perspectives.  And if it is, I want to be the best damn knowledge-cherisher, perspective-seeker there is.  Challenge accepted.

FUUUUUDS

My first FUDS was two and a half years ago.  I'd heard for months on end about this incredible weekend in Florida--volleyball, beaches, parties, and friends--and when the time came, it was exactly how I'd imagined it.  Better, even.  I danced my heart out.  I drank on the beach.  I made out with somebody on the dance floor.  And I didn't stress about any of it.  Not the total amount of alcohol I consumed.  Not how I looked in my bathing suit.  Not what that kiss meant or where it was going or how I should act the next day.  I didn't care.  She didn't care, this Vacation Rebekah.

Vacation Rebekah is amazing.  She's super chill and fun and low-stress.  She doesn't overthink everything.  She revels in taking risks and being a little out of the box.  She's like Everyday Rebekah after a good spit shine.

This past FUDS, Vacation Rebekah had a blast.  She got in Thursday night around 10 and proceeded to drink two glasses of red wine and eat a rich chocolate ice cream bar all before bed.  She spent the next day lounging around.  She spent the night hanging out with friends and dancing and laughing.  She spent the next day playing volleyball and hanging out with her team, an incredible trio of people who were both supportive and challenged her to play better.  She spent the next night dancing and talking with friends, calling it a night early and being happy to do so.  She finished out the weekend with a great day of volleyball, a tough loss in the semis, a hilarious night of friends acting/dancing out songs over dinner, and an easy morning and and easy drive home.

But coming down from FUDS is as hard as the weekend was fun.  It's like coming off a wicked bender and walking straight into a death metal concert.  It's painful, and it's emotional, and the smallest things throw Everyday Rebekah out of whack as she comes back into view.  One year, I almost ruined a stellar relationship with my landlord because she gave me short notice on my way back from Florida about moving everything out of my room that night for a repair job, and I just couldn't handle it.  This year, I took it out on the guy I'm seeing.  Molehills became real hills became mountains.  Cynicism and anxiety took the wheel.  Everyday Rebekah didn't know how to manage the disappointment of coming home with the excitement of seeing him again with the challenges of work and life.

But it's been a week since I returned, and I'm itching for center again.  I looked up yoga classes.  I pondered meditation.  I took a few walks on my own.  But the truth is, I just need to take my own advice.  I just need to stop harping on it.  I need to let it be.  Mountains don't stay mountains forever, and molehills, well, I imagine they're only ever as big as you make them.

Baby Steps

So, those who know me--or who have read my blog--know that I've been on a lot of first dates.  In fact, I took the time tonight to tally up the total number of first dates I've ever been on (to the best of my ability).  For our purposes, I will consider a first date anything that both the man involved and I considered to be a date. This is important because I was kind of a late bloomer, and so for a while, I might have considered any one-on-one meeting with a single male of my age a first date in my head...just to be less lame.  Which, in retrospect, is actually lamer than not going on any dates.

I guess I was a late bloomer in self-respect, too.

So, 16 years after I got my period (my mom's welcome-to-womanhood marker), I've caught up on the blooming and have found myself to be a woman with plenty of quantity.  I've been on at least 33 first dates, agreed to probably 15 second dates, and made out with a few strangers, all of which led to a whopping total of...

3 boyfriends.  A significantly less impressive number.

Even more unimpressive, the duration of those relationships.  The first boyfriend lasted 18 months and ended in a full month of tears and some serious need for therapy down the line.  The second boyfriend came eight years later (my early twenties were pretty dry), and he lasted five months.  The third boyfriend came two weeks after that (my 29th year was pretty busy), but he only lasted for three months.

I'm not exactly the poster child for substantive relationships.

It's not that I don't want one.  I deeply crave the intimacy and love and friendship that comes with a long-term life partner.  The problem is that I did eventually bloom into someone with strong self-respect, and once you've got the self-respect bug, you can't really shake it.  No matter how many attractive men I came across, I couldn't stand to ignore the flaky behavior, the rude comments, or the trust issues that came with them.  I preferred to be alone over pursuing something I knew would never make me happy.

When I finally gave into online dating, the number of dates I went on increased exponentially.  Still, no amount of quantity could disguise the fact that the men I was meeting online were of approximately the same quality as the men I had been meeting in real life.  They were short-term connections at best, non-starters at worst, and they really challenged the doe-eyed version of Louisiana men I'd carried with me through my college years.  A nice, handsome, tall, and muscled man from southern Louisiana who went to church every week and played sports and cheered on the Saints and LSU every weekend.  It turned out that the ideal I'd created in my head was just as misguided as the men I was meeting.  Even if this "perfect" guy existed, would I really like him?  Did he have the intellectual capacity to challenge me?  The values that mattered to me?  The humor to keep us laughing?

Over time, I gave up on the ideal, and along with the ideal, began to give up on voicing the things that really mattered to me.  Church-goer?  Well, I'd settle for agnostic.  Athletic?  Muscular worked, too.  Handsome?  Not ugly was enough.  Nice?  I'd go with decently respectful.

In so doing, I did drop some of the unimportant qualities I'd been setting up as deal breakers for myself: wildly handsome, at least two inches taller, things like that.  But I also let go of some of the things I cared about: someone who wasn't afraid to be affectionate, someone who valued kindness and compassion in all areas of life, someone who attracted me in a substantial way, someone who was looking for a life companion and a family like I was.

I threw out the baby with the bathwater, to the point that my therapist literally asked if I'd considered getting pregnant or adopting on my own down the line.

To cope with the disappointment, I turned to the craft I'd begun learning in high school and the comedy I'd dabbled in when I was in my mid-twenties, and I wrote about all my bad dates.  Everyone likes a good love story, but what people really crave are stories about all the hilariously horrible dates that come before and between love stories.  Maybe it makes them laugh, maybe it makes them grateful, maybe it makes them feel a little less alone in their loneliness.  Whatever it does for others, it's helped me through each time.

But as I spun these tales of dating distress, I fell into the habit of writing about the really good dates, too.  Anyone who's ever seen a romantic comedy knows that examining the details of a budding relationship can timelessly capture the complete infatuation that comes when the feeling is mutual, and it offers to the people who participate an emotional high of their own.

It also creates an unreal image of the relationship that slowly eats away at the real one.

No matter how infatuated you are with someone a week after meeting them, and no matter how much you're sure they're infatuated with you, too, saying it out loud changes things.  Voicing those feelings can be overwhelming.  And a little off-putting for the other person.  And it sets up massive expectations for something that's only just begun.

Writing about it isn't really much different.

It happened with "Jack," even though he never read the blog.

It happened with B, when his ex-girlfriend shared the posts with him.

It happened with California guy, who it later turned out wasn't even close to the idyllic match that I thought he was.

And I think I've finally learned.  16 years ago when I started at the New Orleans Center for Creative Arts and began reading all the miserable and/or suicidal writers that have made history, I pledged to myself, If I have the choice between being a great writer and being happy, I'm taking happy.  Somehow, I forgot that pledge in the midst of life and all its twists and turns, and I'm only just now remembering why I made it in the first place.

New guy and I have been seeing each other for a little over a month now, and to my surprise, it's not that hard not to write about it.  Not because it's not great.  It's the opposite, and I value it, and I want it to grow naturally and without all the limelight that the blog brings.  Sure, it doesn't make for much of a read for you.  And I'm sorry about that.  But I think you'll understand.  I know you will.

Weekend, Week Begin

Bad decisions made within the last 72 hours:

1. Choosing seeded grapes at the grocery and then paying eleven dollars for them

2. Realizing I spend 1 out of every 24 hours with my cat, then coming home and ignoring him until 30 minutes before I go to sleep.

3. Leaving my bedroom door open with the cat in one room and gold stud earrings in the other

4. Touching a slip of paper belonging to a kid who had minutes before sneezed for a full second's duration onto his hands/lap

5. Working for eleven hours on a Monday

6. Waiting until 9pm to start writing a post



Good decisions made within the last 72 hours:

1. Randomly choosing the dark chocolate truffle option from a poorly-labeled Russell Stover box

2. Sending my little brother text messages like BUT WE MISS YOU because he loves how annoying I am

3. Setting ten notifications for an important meeting tomorrow afternoon

4. Reading parenting tweets and appreciating the sweet silence around me

5. Checking my cat's under-the-bed stash for my gold earrings, and finding my missing volleyball shorts

6. Writing this post in a shitty list format, so I can go to sleep early

Bad Science

My students took a quiz this week on observations and variables.  I've only graded the first page of the quiz so far, but I've already altered my lesson plan for tomorrow and next week as a result.  The number of kids who can't distinguish between inferences and observations--between what we think about something and its objective reality--is astounding.  Even more astounding, the number of kids who can't read a paragraph about an experiment and recognize the cause and effect relationship therein.

Here's the paragraph they read:

A scientist wanted to know if water freezes faster with or without sugar added.  She predicted that plain water would freeze faster than sugar water.  To test her idea, she placed ten containers of the same size into the freezer: five with 30 ml of plain water and five with 30 ml of sugar water.  Every thirty minutes, she opened the freezer and recorded her observations.  According to her notes, four of the plain water samples froze before any of the sugar samples did.  So, she concluded: Plain water freezes faster.

Most of them were able to tell me that an independent variable was the cause, but went on to say that the IV for this experiment was whether plain water or sugar water would freeze faster.  Which is not a variable.  It's the entire experiment.  For the dependent variable (DV), or effect, they said it was "which water freezes faster."  Which is, again, not a variable.  It's, again, the entire experiment.  Ask them the hypothesis (line 2), they've got it.  Ask them the conclusion (line 6), they've got it.  But analyzing a text for the fundamental building-blocks of the experiment?  Identifying the cause and effect?  Yikes.

Then, they had to look at this picture and make two observations about it: one quantitative and one qualitative.

Most of my students were able to easily make quantitative observations because their only options are to count or measure, and since there are no measurement markers in the picture, there's really just counting.  But come qualitative, the temptation was too strong: "They're having fun." "They're at recess." "One of the girls is sad."  "The people playing together are friends."  Despite the fact that none of these things are actually visible in the picture (Smiles or frowns, sure, but happiness?  Can you see happiness?), they noted them as observations.

To make matters worse, in class we've been making inferences about fossil images and supporting those inferences with observations of the image.  Some students get it, and they've finished the project with time to spare.  But many of my students have come to me clearly stuck on one side of the equation.

Inference: It is a turtle.

Observations that support my inference:

1. It's swimming.

2. It probably lives in a lake or ocean.

3. It is surrounded by fish, so it must eat them. Turtles eat fish.

They know that you can't see swimming, eating, or an ocean in the picture because it's a skeleton preserved in rock, and yet, they still make the conclusions and cite them as evidence.  They back up conclusions with other conclusions.  They think what they want to think; they don't see what's in front of them.

As a teacher, this is totally frustrating.  It's literally right there.  Stop inferring, already!

But as I was parking in front of my house today after work, considering what I would write on today's blog post, I had this empathy-building revelation:

ADULTS ARE NO BETTER THAN CHILDREN.

(Honestly, we're probably worse because we're adults, and we should've learned already.)

It's kind of amazing, really, that it took me so long to make the connection.  A friend and I have spent the last two weeks completely focused on the new Barking Up the Wrong Tree email blasts that came out about mindfulness.  We talk about "Lefty" constantly.  We talk about the unfounded conclusions we keep coming to, and just how crazy it makes us feel.

In his August 28th post, Andrew Barker explains:

My grandmother didn't like the word "liar." She felt it was too harsh. She used to say people were "telling stories." And that's what the left side of your brain does. Constantly.

The right side of your brain sees things pretty concretely. But that guy to his left is always weaving tales to try and make sense of the information coming in. That's his job.

We need Lefty to give meaning to life. He interprets your experiences. If Lefty sees real patterns that others don't, people call you creative. But there's also a problem...

Lefty often screws up.

Barker goes on:

As the old saying goes, "The map is not the territory." Lefty doesn't have perfect information. And sometimes he's too clever for his own good. He's part of you -- and you are fallible. So sometimes this happens:

Right Brain: Everyone at the table is frowning. They're not laughing at our brilliant jokes.

Left Brain: Obviously, they hate us and are plotting our death.

This is exactly what my students are doing with their observations.  Their "lefty" is making up stories as soon as their eyes hit the picture, and while that can be a useful trait, they're ignoring their right brain and all the conflicting facts that lie therein.  The turtle's not moving; how can it be swimming?  It's a skeleton in a rock; how can it live anywhere?

The cause-effect relationship becomes hazy, too.  I co-exist in space with plenty of creatures on a daily basis that I don't eat.  But because they've seen a turtle eat a fish before on TV, predictions become conclusions.  Turtle skeletons eat whatever's next to them.

And that's bad science.

Barker calls the onslaught of these predictions in our daily lives "monkey brain."  You know when that guy hasn't texted you back in twelve hours, and you're sitting in front of the TV staring at the Food Network but all the couture cakes in the world can't keep you from the internal hum of "he's going to break up with me"?  Or when that girl seems distracted a lot these days and you find yourself wasting your lunch break searching Google for "reasons why women seem distant"?  That's monkey brain.  It's the annoying voice in your head telling you unhelpful and often untrue stories.  It's Lefty spinning bullshit into gold.

Not surprisingly, this leads to all sorts of breakdowns in relationships, in communication, in common sense.  I broke up with many a guy in my mid-twenties because I let Lefty drive the bus.  Today, this happened at recess:

Me: Oh my god, M--, don't do that!  Do you want worms?!

Student: No.

Me: Then don't put dirt in your mouth!

Student: [shrugs]

Yes, it's terrifying that a ten year old still thinks eating dirt is a good idea.  But think of all the stupid things you did or said or felt last year because Lefty led you there.  We're not so different.

Unsurprisingly, the answer to the Lefty debacle is mindfulness, and the answer to bad science is paying better goddamn attention to what you're doing...which is basically mindfulness.

I've been attempting this recently: taking note of what I hear and feel to recenter myself when Lefty gets to be too much.  My therapist tells me to watch the thoughts come in and go out as I breathe.  Barker's research also recommends labeling the shit your "monkey brain" slings at you.

What if he's completely forgotten about me?  --  Worrying

If she asked about it, I'd say... -- Thinking

The turtle is swimming. -- Inferring NOT OBSERVING!!!!!!

Perhaps the worst part is that institutions have their own version of Lefty, too.  Look at politics and businesses and marketing and organizations.  When they ignore facts or lose sight of the details of what they're doing or gloss over the cause-effect relationships they manage, things go awry.  Bad science, bad management, bad outreach.

Take, for example, this letter I got in the mail today:

CATHOLIC OPINION RESEARCH SURVEY

A NATIONAL SURVEY OF 10,000,000 CATHOLICS CONCERNING THE ROLE OF RELIGION IN AMERICAN PUBLIC LIFE

Dear Rebekah,

This is likely the largest survey of Catholic voter opinion ever conducted.  ...We expect this survey of 10,000,000 Catholics to receive wide media coverage and the results to be studied carefully by America's elected officials.  The purpose of this survey is to...

(1) Send a strong and clear message to politicians in Washington that America's Catholics are dismayed at how our own government has been waging an all-out war on the traditional, moral, and religious values that made America great; and

(2) Help CatholicVote identify and mobilize millions of Catholics to make their views known in the all-important Elections on November 8th so we can end our government's assault on America's religious and moral traditions.

IMPORTANT CONTRIBUTION SECTION

(1) I am enclosing my $10 Survey Processing Contribution to help you pay for the tabulation, processing, and distribution of the results...

(2) Please include my survey answers in the overall tabulated survey...

(3) I am also enclosing an additional gift (above and beyond $10) to help CatholicVote educate, register, and turnout millions of new conservative Catholic voters...

[deep breath]

It's not just that it flies in the face of what I think Jesus taught and how that translates into governmental policies.  It straight-up spits in the eye of what it means to survey.  And somehow that pisses me off more.  I thought we could all at least agree that a survey was a measurement tool meant to collect data, not a cloaked instrument of political indoctrination.

And I was really excited when I first got the letter!  I tore open the envelope thinking, Finally, Catholic organizations want to know what we really think!

But I'd been duped.

It was just brainwashing paraphernalia from the Trump campaign.

Propaganda from a man whose words are more likely to be confused with Voldemort than with Jesus.

Rich bullshit from a true monkey brain.

When It Rains...

It pours.

I started seeing this guy last weekend.  I'm not going to give him a fake name or call him by his first initial or SAY ANYTHING ABOUT HIM WHATSOEVER because I've finally learned my lesson. Writing about new romantic interests is now officially off-limits on the blog.  This way, he gets to hear about my feelings from me; his ex-girlfriend won't send my blog to him in an attempt to undermine our relationship; and he won't later rub my blog posts in my face as he tries to get me to admit that I'm in love with him even though I'm not.

These are real life stories.  Of men I've written about on the blog.  Who I am, as you might guess, no longer chummy with.

I'd call them struggles, but to give them that much weight would be an act of narcissism too great for even me, a woman who blogs about the mundane minutiae of her life and hopes people will read it.

Back to the rain.

Prior to seeing said fellow, I was seeing "pie pan guy," which is what we'll call the medical resident I went on four dates with who was perpetually late and non-communicative and mostly interested in himself.  It started off decently well with a nice meal and interesting conversation and a bizarre interaction with a questionably British pirate on Poydras St.  But then it petered off, and I let it go on too long, first hoping to see him again to see what it was, and then just trying to get my damn pan back.  Weeks after our fourth date, we settled on an Sunday afternoon meeting, which happened to coincide with his birthday.  It would be super weird, I thought, to see him on his birthday.  But I really wanted my pan back.  I could break things off later.  When it wasn't his birthday.  The day before, though, after an awesome first date with the new guy who I won't say anything else about, I canceled it.  I had some sleep to catch up on, I said. (Which was only sort of a lie.)

And then, when I didn't respond to his follow-up message, I must have set off some alarm inside him that goes off when he realizes a woman just doesn't care anymore.  Within three days, I incurred more texts than I had in the four weeks before.

He hoped I was okay.  He hoped I had a relaxing weekend.  His most recent rotation was rough, but it was over, and his birthday had been busy but fun.  He hoped my week had been going well so far.   He apologized for being a flake recently.  He'd really like to see me again if I was up for it.

It was too little, too late.

I tried to let him down easy.  I'd been busy and then sick, I said, and I just didn't think he had time for me.

"Well wait a minute," he said.  It was just one rotation.  It was the hardest one.  He'll get off work earlier now.  Was I already asleep?  He still had the pie pan.

Seriously?  Now you care that you have my pie pan? (I didn't say that part.)

The next evening, after occupying myself with all that comes from being sick and working anyway, I sat down and explained in a series of too-long text messages that, essentially, he'd had his chance.  I'd explained weeks ago that being 30 minutes late to two separate dates, texting no more than once a week, never asking questions about me, and never setting a future date did not communicate interest.  He'd chosen to continue behaving that way, though, and I was done.  I hoped he'd enjoy the pie pan.

"C'mon!" he said.  "Give me another chance!"  He'd lost 10-15 pounds over this brutal rotation.

"And a girl," I said.  "But you'll survive both."

"Sheesh."  He'd just moved, on top of it all.  It was horrible timing.  But he really does like me.

I considered explaining how a simple "Life is crazy busy, but give me three weeks" might have been appreciated three weeks ago, but it wasn't worth it.

"I'm sorry" was all I wrote.

He texted dejectedly that it was our loss.

Perhaps it was our loss, I admitted, but I was done, and only time would settle that score.

"Damn," he said. "Take care."  But I had already muted the conversation.  I got the messages the next day.

I know that I could have told him about the new guy, and that that would've brought a faster end to the string of one-more-chance pleas, but I refused to play that card.  I wasn't turning him down because of that.  I was turning him down because he'd been disrespectful of my time and then barely communicated with me for weeks on end.  I need more than that from a romantic partner.  I deserve better than that.  And if he couldn't muster up sufficient respect and consideration in the first month of dating, how could I expect him to behave any differently when the glow was gone?

And to be truthful, the glow never really arrived.  There was that, too.

So I've had a few days of respite since then--with occasional worries that he'll text again and I'll have to block him--and now Friday evening is here, and I can be sick in bed as much as I want and not have to worry about waking up early or sneezing in my elbow or surviving the last hour of work after my meds have run out.

And then, as I'm laying in bed in front of a paused Netflix screen, scrolling through Facebook on my phone, a notification panel drops down.  I have an Instagram request.  From no other than the guy that I visited this summer who had--in only three days--spurned me, insulted my religion, and rubbed a blog post in my face.  "You wrote two posts about me."  Yeah, I said, in February.  I text my friend, "This guy barely talked to me while I was sleeping in his living room, and now he wants to follow me on social media.  WTF?"

Needless to say, I did not accept his request.

I wonder if there's something out there in the universe that says, Hey, she's sick and tired and seeing someone.  Let's pull a few people out of the woodwork and see how she juggles that into the mix.

I think I handled it okay, though.  And now I'm going to go watch some Gossip Girl as my reward.

Monday, Monday

I'm so tired.

Not like normal end-of-day tired, but like, will-I-make-it-to-my-bed-with-my-teeth-brushed kind of tired.  Will-I-have-the-energy-to-change-into-pajamas kind of tired.  Am-I-getting-sick kind of tired.

I am.  As much as I hate to admit it, I know I am.

I didn't feel great coming home from work on Friday, or even on the way to work that morning, but I just assumed it was two-weeks-into-school exhaustion, and that with some extended sleep, I'd feel fine on the other side of Sunday.

Of course, I didn't end up getting as much sleep as I intended.  Between a date on Friday and volleyball on Saturday morning and celebrating the birth of my friend Mick on Saturday night and church and things on Sunday, I got a pretty average amount of sleep across the duration of the weekend.

Which is probably why I'm coughing on my couch and trying to keep my now heavy-lidded eyes from shutting entirely before I finish this post.

I guess I shouldn't really complain.  If you put me back at Friday evening, I'd do it all over again.  I'd still go on that date till early in the morning and play volleyball in summer heat and sing karaoke in Kenner and have lunch on Banks street and go to sleep Sunday night with a smile because it was one of the best weekends--in a string of nice weekends--that I've had this summer.

Enough of that for now.  I've filled my Monday writing requirement, and you'd had your fair share of vague and insubstantial run-on sentences.  I'm headed to bed, and I hope I get better soon, but I'll be dreaming of this weekend.  And wishing for more weekends like it to come.