Blind Side

I got blindsided this week, kicked in the teeth. I felt someone treated me unfairly and with a profound lack of empathy. I got upset, I got a fiery stress ball in my stomach, my heart started racing and my muscles clenched. I felt like someone had snapped the rope I teeter on like a rubber band, increasing the tenuousness of my grip, my balance. I ranted to a few close friends, made a possibly ill-advised facebook post, paced back and forth, mind spinning, and then realized that this is not how to live. Realized that I was letting someone else affect the quality of my precious day and so I’ve decided to employ the power-rant as a life rule. When something really, really upsets me, I will rant with reckless abandon for no more than 48 hours and then it ceases completely and I will step back into my happy pod and move on.

I have to deal with the situation of course, and I’ll be lawyer shopping over the next few weeks which was not my plan for the next few weeks, but I’ve considered how to make this situation most bearable for me and that’s what I’m going to do. I’m not going to wrestle endlessly with what to do, or if this is fair or that is fair, or what has the best chances for success, I’m simply going to do what I think will cause me the least ongoing stress. I’m gonna let go and roll the dice and accept there are things I can’t control. What will be, will be, no point worrying about the future. If I have a future, that’s a win right there and I'll worry about how to survive then. Stress is canciferous, fireballs in stomach are canciferous, clenched muscles are canciferous and I need to be an inconducive environment for cancer and I mustn't waste precious days and precious energy.

So after brief derailment, I’m back in my pod, although sweating terribly which is bearable only because the weather report predicts quick end to heat. I drove the tall one to a baseball game today and just seeing his thick, polyester baseball pants made me suffer, I don’t know how they play in the blazing sun on days like this. The whole ride down to the field, we both agreed that the car smelled like urine. We smelled each other, and both passed the sniff test. G thought it might be his t-shirt, same one he wore in bio when they were dissecting pregnant pigs. Thought it might be remnants of the pig preserving chemicals involved. I can’t stop thinking about the pregnant pigs... where do they come from, and I can’t even pretend they died naturally in childbirth. Are pregnant pigs harvested for high school science classes? Where? How? What is the name of the business? What on earth would you name that business? Who starts a business like that? Is it really necessary to dissect a pregnant pig in class? High school multiplied by each town, each state, that’s a lot of pigs. Poor little pigs, says this hypocritical bacon eater.

When he got out, the car still smelled, I don’t get it, I need Click and Clack. I thought my adventures with unexpected bodily secretions was confined to the barf-a-day club, one of my cats has forced me to join. It’s so exciting -- where will the cat barf be today? Will I step in it barefoot when I’m getting out of bed? Will it be among the folds of a skirt I left on the floor? Oh so many places it could be, and rarely the same place twice, maybe I should appreciate that feat, my cat’s unwillingness to be redundant in barfing locales, but I don’t, I just don’t.

I bought non-toxic nail polish today, but it smells almost as bad as the toxic stuff I’ve been using. Nail polish is rated by how many toxic chemicals they chose to leave out. There’s regular, which I guess everyone admits is just plain poison. 3-free, which is sans the three most toxic chemicals and 5-free, sans the five most toxic. I’ve been using 3-free which stinks to high heaven and seems as toxic as anything can be even through the mask I wear. Can’t help it though, it comes in the clear blue sky color I love which for some bizarre reason is called Teeny Weeny Bikini, I assure you, there is not one of those in my possession to match so you may go to the beach without fear. Today, I’m painting lego pieces with white nail polish for a movie the young one is plotting. He needs a white lego body, and some white accessories. I pondered white tape cut meticulously to size and then white spray paint and then it hit me, white nail polish, genius. It’s working great so far and I successfully used my fine work for leverage. Sorry, I’m not doing any more until you take a shower. Boy is clean and I’m back to work.

I’m doing an outdoor show in Worcester tomorrow. Last minute decision, to mooch half a tent space from a friend. It’s quite uncool to do this, but I’ve done this show before, it’s huge, it’s not really juried and I know they like my work. In fact, years past when I check in, the woman with the clipboard is wearing a pair of my double-drop atomica earrings, so I figured on the outside chance we get caught they’ll be cool. The organizers of this show, really are great. Needed some quick cash and we’ve arranged to be next to another friend, the weather is going to be nice and I think it will be a lot of fun. The bad part is, my favorite jeweler is going to be there, I don’t often run into her which is good, because there’s so much temptation. My 48 hours are up, so there will be no bitching and moaning from me, and hopefully no jewelry buying, but that I can’t guarantee.