plant-based portfolio
GOT NO AIM AT ALL
Some people get all hopeful and excited when school starts. On the one hand I get it: New year! New me! New chances! On the other hand, maybe those people are just high on permanent markers and or poisoned by mechanical-pencil lead. For me the beginning of this school year has been nothing but an anxiety spiral. The tension between trying to provide Aaron with everything he needs to be successful vs letting him figure it all out independently (and possibly fail).* The horror of trying to help a shorter, stylish teen boy find clothes when he is as picky about fit as an elderly Italian tailor. The big unknown of college and how do you even start narrowing the options? The fun layer of gender anxiety on top of the normal teen anxieties.
*Inevitable! Not very high-stakes! Not really, at the end of the day, my problem! But parent feelings get all mixed up with kid feelings when bad things happen.
I also took about a million vacation days this year, between the London fun and the Pacific Northwest adventure. I do not regret one bit of it; but I have to pretty much work straight through 2019 now, particularly if I want to save vacation days for a thing that I do not want to talk about right now. VAGUEDIARY: ACTIVATE! (You know I’ll blab eventually. Be patient with me.)
The kid is feeling the anxiety too, in many small and large ways. Apparently one was supposed to have saved all the materials from a previous class in a binder to use in the next class—although this was literally never mentioned until the first day—so he is being punished for Marie Kondo-ing his schoolwork over the summer. (The teacher seems unable to give a straight answer as to how big a deal this is.) He is supposed to take an online class to fulfill an art credit that his aggressive schedule does not allow time for, but has a counselor explained how this works, despite diligent teen emailing? No. I hear reports that his Spanish teacher speaks in a Castilian monotone mumble that makes understanding difficult for the indifferent language-learner. And so on.
Then there was our whole existential conversation last night, when I was very tired and crabby and Not In The Mood. Do you have to “love” something to do it for a living? Do you have to have a “passion” for something to study it in college? How do you know if it’s the right thing? What if you change your mind? What if you get a job and it turns out you did not even need your degree at all? What if you are good at your job but you like it only okay; do you just do it until you die? Isn’t that kind of sad? Isn’t life kind of sad? How do you feel okay about that? How do you stop worrying and then getting mad at yourself for worrying?
My answers were much longer (and sometimes crabby), but generally thus—no; no; you don’t; that’s fine; check out your very own father, the “nearly-a-history-PhD” computer programmer; check out your very own mother, who has an entire successful career that she finds merely tolerable; meh, debatable: the idea is to have other good stuff in your life besides paid work; yes but so what, it’s what we’ve got; million-dollar question; I don’t know, DRUGS? SEX? ICE CREAM?
I’m sympathetic but sometimes I just cannot wrestle with the Big Questions out loud, especially when I am probably expected to impart some parental wisdom or (at least) comfort. Do you think I would have obfuscated my human despair with 20 years and 100 million words of published diary content if I felt content about these things? I love you! I’m sorry it sucks! Do what I do when it sucks: go to bed!
MORE SUMMERTIME SADNESS
In my upstairs bathroom I have a metal vertical thing that holds three extra rolls of toilet paper. As a proactive housekeeper and a fan of toilet paper, I usually grab two more rolls and fill the thing when there is only one roll left. After a few rounds of this I start to feel sorry for the bottom roll, coming close to having its time on the big stage and then BOOM, two more rolls dumped on its head. I have started to rotate Bottom Roll up to the top when this happens, and putting the new rolls on the bottom. Bottom Roll has been patient. Fair is fair.
FAUNA
Besides the yelly orange cat in the last entry, I forgot to make note of some of the other animals we saw on the Oregon/California trip. Elk! Lots of birds of prey! A cute skinny black snake that quickly got out of my way in the redwood forest! The snake was just lying there on the trail, in full sun, and went quickly back into the shadows as we approached. It was probably like ah fuck, I just got warmed up. Sorry snake.
Also, apologies if you saw my Twitter post and know this already but a mouse (apparently) got in our house and Murphy cat took care of it. I came downstairs at Ridiculous O’Clock in the morning and saw a weird something in the corner of the hall. What is that? Is it a cat toy? NO! (But also: YES! It used to be!) It was a small mouse, twisted and broken-necked and slightly damp, and Murphy was like YES YES IT WAS ME OH MY GOD SO COOL YOU SHOULD HAVE BEEN THERE. I am sure he has told the story four thousand times to the other cats by now and they are so sick of it.
I was seriously grossed out, but LT helped me clean up, and after thoroughly inspecting every bit of the house for poop, chewed-on things, and mouse urine (via blacklight), I do not believe we actually have a mouse problem. Why did this one come in? How did this one come in? How much, and how quickly, did it regret its mistake? (Murphy says: more mice please! It was awesome. Also look at my claws I’m totally the best.)
CHECK CHECK CHECK IT OUT
Recently finished books: We Cast A Shadow, The Impossible Climb, and Molly Fox’s Birthday.
I also highly recommend that you listen to the monotonous-in-a-good-way, hazy-methadone-twilight, acoustic-droney-shoegaze album I Declare Nothing by Tess Parks and Anton Newcombe (of Brian Jonestown Massacre + other projects fame). Or maybe don’t listen to it if you have stuff to do as it quickly leads to lighting candles, popping 50 or so milligrams of THC, pouring some red wine, and wishing you still smoked cigarettes.
Other things I recommend: working out in the morning (it sounds like it sucks but it really doesn’t), reading more “young adult” books, using sticky velcro things to hang stuff instead of putting holes in your walls, solar-powered string lights, blue shop towels instead of paper towels for terrible messes, reaching out to your friends and planning a meet instead of waiting to be asked, and changing your frequently-barfing cat’s diet to 100% cans and cutting out the kibble cold turkey, no matter how pitifully she whimpers.
—mimi smartypants needs the amino acid taurine in order to thrive.