The thing about being an adult that they don't tell you as a kid is how roaringly, howlingly, utterly demoralizingly BORING it is most of the time. What I would give for an hour of all-out, all-consuming imaginative PLAY, the way I did when I was a kid. The real world is an utter drag at least 90% of the time.
That was my facebook post this evening. And its disgustingly true. I don't know what I expected from adulthood, but it wasn't this. My life is sometimes little more than a loop of letting dogs in and out, washing the same damned dishes and clothes over and over, driving, and worrying over money. No wonder I stopped keeping house. What's the point? Really, it's just going to get dirty again.
What if I entered a life of complete surrender to entropy? What would happen if I just failed to do any life maintenance work at all?
I'll tell you what, besides homelessness and starvation....even more boredom. Maintaining the little buggery buggeries of life is sometimes the only thing that keeps me sane... and I barely manage those.
Once in a while I pause, look around myself, and realize that my life is completely going to shit. In some cases, as noted in an earlier post, this is quite literal. And even now, with my not-house-trained pup, shit continues to be... not a figurative expression. But it's amazing how I can KNOW there's dog poops on the rug next to the laundry room... and just not give a damn. It's not going anywhere. I can pick it up any time. Entropy.
When I was married I became convinced that my husband's body somehow manufactured bits of paper and small coins. They were everywhere; every surface seemed to have a little pile of wadded or folded up paper and change. Now I look around and must conclude that my person is manufacturing books and small toiletries. Within eyeshot at present I see a bottle of hand creme, a tube of yeast infection cream (in the living room, yes, but not for the reason you're thinking. It's also used to treat ringworm on Lucky's paw... which I'm beginning to despair of ever curing and I've started referring to him as "zombie paw"), a dog brush, an empty tissue box with a wad of black dog hair in it, one sock, a tube of chapstick, and a nail clipper. And god only knows what's in my sofa.
Sometimes I want to scoop everything up, put it in a box, and shove it out to the curb. Would I miss it? Really? I'm not sure. And imagine coming home to a room empty of all objects except furniture and a stereo. Hell maybe I could opt out of furniture as well and just revel in the empty space. IT would be like being Japanese. It would be like coming home every day to a new house: you know, that New House feel, where everything is clean and empty and feels bigger and more hopeful than your old, dirty, crowded house that smells like wet dog? LIke that.
Things. Things and chores.'
And dogs. Okay.
Actually, I shouldn't complain. This year is off to a glowing start. The ex is moving back to his hometown, with his babymomma and family, more than 900 miles away. This in itself is cause for joy. I may actually not set eyes on him again for four years, until our son graduates high school.
I will soon have an actual OFFICE at work, no more gray cubicle corner, but an actual office with walls (which, granted don't go all the way to the ceiling, but hey) and a WINDOW. Like human people. THIS is my year.
So things are good. But this week has been an unhealthy one. G got strep throat, which I remember from when I was a kid and I know how awful it feels, like you're trying to swallow a bundle of needles; and Scipio got some sort of infection that has made one side of his little ratty face swell up and has given him a red rat-snotty nose and a really miserable wheeze when he breathes. A sick rat is a really pitiful thing. So I took the kid and the rat to the doctor. No, separate doctors... and now I'm administering antibiotics twice daily to both of them. I am Florence Frickin' Nightingale. Angel of mercy.
I of course do not wish my child to be ill, ever. But now that he's 14... well, it's sort of nice when he really needs me, and wants to snuggle up and hold my hand, and lets me smooth his hair back and put my hand on his forehead. I guess I will always want to do that. So I take my little pleasures where I can find them before he feels well again and jacks back into the Matrix.
Leaving me alone... in this utterly boring and eventless adult life I've been sentenced to. I see more blogging in my future.
No comments:
Post a Comment