I was going to bed with the guilt of a dirty kitchen, the physical representation of all the shoulds smeared around the house and our lives.
At night the dirty dishes rot into a dream about a house so humid and wrecked that its ceilings crack and fall apart like a blue-grey moldy loaf of bread.
In the morning, the dishes are still there, along with their stale smell of guilt that hasn’t had a chance to air out.
It was quick dinner because I didn’t have it in me for more, but the time it took stretched as my focus wained. Every ingredient, every vegetable washed, every chop of the pairing knife was just one more. Just one more. Just one more.
I’m not upset at you. I’m just really tired. I have run too deep into the red zone to come out of fight or flight.
And then came the chicken nugget that tasted like fish.
I just couldn’t.
I just cry.
I’m so tired.
I love you so much.
I knew it was time, the shakes are here, the foot tap, the roll your head from side to side. Baby, I’ve been here before. I know this room, I’ve walked this floor. I also know how the rotten floor gives way to my step, and how I fall into a basement I didn’t even think could go so deep.
So I go for this walk. I smoke this joint. I sit down by the library and write this. I had been wanting to write something to the caregivers group, but right then it was too much, and now it seems too far.
It’s times like these when life feels like a lot.