I spent the weekend in a bad mood. And I can’t let the bad mood be. I get mad at myself for being in a bad mood, why, why, why when the rest of the world is so screwed up and there are people who are actually suffering that you can’t be content with your contentful life? Then I waste extra energy on it. I can still feel the bad mood this morning. Sigh. I know it’s mostly hormone driven, but you can’t think clearly when everything is irritating you all or making you sad or whatever all the time. I run through all the things I’m supposed to do to make the bad mood go away – go outside, talk to a friend, pretend I’m happy, go for a run, cook, talk to myself like I’m my best friend “it’s ok, Doris, it’s just a bad mood”, do some jumping jacks, gently tell myself when I hear the words – “I suck. I suck. I suck.” that it’s not true. Ahhhh.. grrr. When I get this way, I get needy in a kind of unattractive way. (Is needy ever attractive? No.) I go around the house asking people to give me a pep talk and tell me that I’m doing great. Vince complies, but rolls his eyes.
I gave all the $ that I w(sh)ould have spent on Vince’s college prep stuff to Edda’s special needs program. The class goes out twice a week for the entire year to learn life skills – like grocery shopping or home depot projects or to the post office. The budget for the entire year was $130. For 14 kids! For 50-ish outings! Crazy. So that money went there.
College applications are painful. None of us likes it. All of us like the going to college part. The applying part sucks so much. And I hate saying it sucks because, what the hell, Edda is not going to apply to college. She’s stuck at home with needy, moody me. I should be grateful. For Vince going, for us to be able to be able to afford to pay to apply & attend. I suck for not feeling grateful. I get anxious about the deadlines and remind Vince of them daily – you need to get transcripts, you need to get recommendations, where is the essay?, and the supplemental essays?, Jeremy is trying to help out by playing mediator and with the tracking of deadlines, Vince looks at me and is like – do I really have to tell them now what I’m going to study? How do I know now what I want to do later? Who the hell ever knows what they want to do with their life? Do I know what I’m doing (besides trying to encourage you to apply to college by the published deadlines)? I have no idea. Do you ever read a memoir where someone is like – I knew I was going to do this when I was 4 years old and I have not wavered from that goal for 68 years? That person is lucky. The rest of us bumble along and try to figure it out each day like a drunken, walker and as you are trying to figure it out, random things happen, like earthquakes that flatten your house or you meet a beautiful, enchanting person that you can’t take your eyes off of and then you have to change directions completely. I am trying to be grateful. I’m trying to be nice. I have only 10 months left with Vince in the house and I will try not to ruin the past (relatively sane) 17 years with 10 months of bad mothering behavior. Jeremy tells me not to let it go, he tells me to roll with it.
We had Sunday night dinner with neighbors and family. I made Lauren’s mom’s famous (well, famous to us) kugel for Rosh Hashanah. The Jews at the table declared it delicious, one of the best kugels they had ever eaten. The rest of us were like – hmmm, a noodle casserole for dessert? sure, I’ll try it. I’ll post the recipe here for my future reference.
