This pandemic has done something to me. That has been an ongoing theme, hasn't it? I am not silent about it - at all. But I have this underlying fear that it has changed who I am forever. I used to think that I was unshakeable. But I feel fragile now. I used to think I was funny and witty. But I don't feel like that anymore. I feel like I'm a shiny penny that got all rusty. I'm sprouting gray hair all of a sudden. The other day, my oldest was going through my hair. "Oh my God, mom! You have EIGHT gray hairs. I'm going to pluck them out." I shooed her away, "I'll be bald at this rate!" I'm getting older and the children are too. I feel it in my soul.
Here we are in the middle of all this and I feel so strange. There are things that need to be done, that are coming at us fast. My oldest is a junior. She is starting school virtually next week, which I have all kinds of feelings about. This time next year we'll be getting ready to look at college applications. We'll really have to narrow down her list and schedule virtual tours. Virtual tours. Fuck.
There will be ACTs and SATs and getting our finances in order for FAFSA. In 9 months, there will be senior pictures to schedule. My youngest has things to do. She'll need a portfolio and application materials finished by November for Governor's School for next summer. There will be permit tests to study for. She wants to go to a different high school than her home high school and she will need to take the ACT and do applications. These are things that need to happen, that we need to prepare for- pandemic or not.
And yet, I don't even want to bring any of it up. To anyone. To myself even. I feel like just adjusting to what this school year will look like is taxing and overwhelming enough. We are in this weird holding pattern. A new normal. Except it's not normal at all. Can there even be a new normal for people that know and understand what life can really be like? What life was like before? I'm not sure. I can get used to things. I can get used to wearing a mask and I can get used to things being canceled and I can get used to the fear and the discord but I'm not sure that I can ever accept these things as being normal. I really struggle with that.
I feel like I am living in a haze. Where time seems suspended. It's like waking up from a dream and opening your eyes and for just a moment - you don't know who you are, where you are, what day it is, whether it's closer to day or night. Regardless, you are safe, you are in your own bed. But for just a few seconds, you don't have your bearings straight. That's what this is like. It's like being stuck in that moment. It's not bad or good. It's just strange.
And then there is me. Here I am at the finish line of the raising up my children. I am 36 years old. Then what? Then I have this whole life to worry about my adult children? I'm going to re-invent myself. I'm going to start wearing funky shoes. That's going to be my signature thing. The lady that wears funky shoes. I brought these:
Maybe wearing fun, funky shoes will make me feel fun and funky. Maybe then I'll feel like I shiny penny again.
I probably will dye the gray out. Or maybe do an Anne Bancroft type of thing?
Maybe I'll write stories. About real people with a lot of mystery and a little bit of sex. Mostly to entertain myself and pass the time.
I'll plant flowers and cook dinner for my husband. Maybe we'll be able to travel again someday. Maybe I'll go to Spain for a month and we can be strangers for a while. I need some adventure in my life.
The point it is, I feel tired. I am not funny anymore. Everything is weird. The children are in a life-changing moment and I am in a crisis about what to do with the next 50 years of my life. I'll let you know if I ever figure any of it out.
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