I know it’s all meant to be positivity
This is unadulterated whinging.
I know in the battle for the soul of the US and the UK we’re meant to keep fighting. But largely this battle is one that I’m fighting out of pure fucking spite against people that would see me, and people like me, dead. It’s one I feel like I’m fighting against throwbacks to my childhood. It’s one were I feel like the person I want to come fight for me is my dad*, because he would be a quiet yet resourceful tower of fucking strength.
And right now every day is an uphill battle. The job is painful and hard, and I daren’t talk about it too much with people for fear that I’m going to end up crying. What’s worse is that I think it’s really fucking important which makes it feel like failure - but failure to society as a whole - if I walk away. It also feels like I’ll be failing my students if I walk away. I keep just about coping, but it’s becoming a closer and closer run thing. And I keep trying to console myself with the fact the quarter is nearly over, but when I think about that I just think: “…and then a week later the next quarter begins”.
And that would be bad enough by itself, but the political situation keeps feeling more and more insurmountable. Because of the job I don’t have enough time to put in the effort to fight, which feels like another failing. I keep thinking “I just need to set aside 5 minutes to do this” and not managing, because every minute is spoken for at least twice over.
And then add in the fact that our house project - which was meant to be stressful but in a good way -stressful in a ‘work with you to achieve something’ way, is proving to be a completely insane battle with the county about what is-or-isn’t a forest. And what paperwork we need to submit. And about getting clarity about what assessments we need to submit, where they are using terms that they’re claiming specialists will know, and when we ask specialists they have no clue. And the fact that because it was very wet there on the 9th day of a month that received a month’s preciptiation in 9 days when we visited the site, that they think it’s really prone to flooding. To add to the joy, what one person says is not the same as what another person says - and because there’s no up-to-date written guidance it feels like we’re standing on quicksand.
And given the political situation, every time we spend money on it, I wonder if I’m going to be kicked out of the country - or need to leave because the HitlerBannon/45-youth will make it unliveable here - and will I(we) then regret that wasted money? And with the constant battle with one particular individual at the county, there is absolutely no optimism or joy in it. We have gone from feeling like we had a great piece of land, to feeling like we’ve got a near unbuildable lot. Not because there’s actually any critical areas***, but because it feels like one particular person at the county is deliberately going out of their way to make it impossible - or grossly over expensive - to get the permit to build.
And then we have the minor joy that one of our cars now leaks enough that it smells like a swamp inside. And I don’t have the time to fix it, and it’s one of those simple-but-expensive jobs, because it takes lots of time. Of course, I’m scheduling that for my week off, but… it’s dragging me down and down, and more so because I’ve ordered $300 worth of parts to fix it, but $150 of them is me guessing at where the water’s coming in based on other people’s reports. But I have no idea if it truly is because I have no time to investigate it - but the parts take so long to come (and are almost double the price if I buy them locally) that I need to preorder them.
…and then a few days ago, the icing on the f’king cake. We have ants in our kitchen. We can’t find the source of them, and they so far have demonstrated no ability to find food, because everything was, and is, sealed. But that doesn’t stop it being a process of killing ants every time we go in there. The landlord’s put down some antkiller stuff in the loft, but after 48 hours they’re still coming. This afternoon it looked better, then I opened the cupboard and found about 8 ants just meandering around.
I really could have done without it.
So yeah, positivity is in short supply recently. Mainly what I want to do is hide under the f’kin duvet.
* who notoriously dealt with a vile, abusive child who decided to shout unpleasant things at my mother by picking the child up by his ears and carrying him, screaming, back to his parents. My dad then explained to them that the language of their child, and by extension them, was unacceptable and that he wouldn’t stand for it, and then dumped the child on their doorstep before quietly leaving**.
** My dad brooked no shit. Mainly in a very polite way, but when pissed off he was a force to be reckoned with. I wish he was here now.
*** There’s one, it’s small.
Originally published at Mostly lemon based. You can comment here or there.