Some Kind of Thursday

 It's Thursday again. I am not surly today. Neither am I serene. On the May long week-end (Canadian), Ottawa was hit by a derecho, a term I had never heard before and would happily never hear again. Defined as "a line of intense, widespread, and fast-moving windstorms and sometimes thunderstorms that moves across a great distance and is characterized by damaging winds", it was an extremely violent and destructive event that took down a ton of trees, caused a lot of property damage and had some people powerless for ten days. We got off pretty easy, which we appreciated extra because we were sick with Covid at the time. 

For the last couple of days the environmental news was full of dire forecasts for today, including a tornado watch. I think we all have a touch of PTSD, and I think this precipitated a small-scale but significant mental health crisis for me. I knew rationally that it was better for us to know, that we should just do what we could to prepare and then let the funnel clouds fall where they may, but I was extremely anxious and on-edge all day. As it happened, we got nothing but a heavy downpour and some thunder and lightning both at school and at my house. I'm grateful for this, of course, but also exhausted and kind of weepy.

Eve and I are going to Hamilton tomorrow to spend the week-end visiting friends, including my/her professor and her daughter and grandkids and some of Eve's classmates, and bringing some stuff to her house for next year and starting to fix up her room. Matt is going Mexico for work on Saturday for the week. Angus left on Tuesday for a baseball trip with six college friends, culminating in a night in the house where they filmed Field of Dreams, which was one of his friends' grad gift. It's all good, but a lot of moving parts, and my covid-recovering brain is slow-moving and I think that just added to the anxiety, trying to remember where all of my family members are and are going to be. In one funny-very-nearly-not-funny turn of events, Matt was packing the car for us and opened the center console and found all of our passports still in it from when we went down to Angus's graduation. Eve and I separately heard him say this and went "yeah? So? OH MY GOD", realizing we were about to blithely drive off tomorrow with the passport he needs to fly to Mexico the day after. Whew.

And oh yeah, Angus graduated! We were extremely happy, of course, that there was going to be a graduation and that we could get across the border for it, but we were still recovering and not quite sure how everything was going to go. It was a really fun week-end. Everyone else in residence had moved out the week before and the previous week had been nothing but senior activities, many involving alcohol. Friday night was a booze cruise and then a party at a house one of the baseball parents had rented.  Saturday Angus showed up at the hotel to have lunch with us, walked out the door and started to cross the parking lot to the Red Robin and then realized he was too hungover. We found this absolutely hilarious and gave him our room key so he could go have a nap instead. I did take a picture of his shame, though.

If he hadn't been on the baseball team we probably would have kind of been at loose ends, so in this case the baseball relationships were a really nice thing to have. Someone's parents were staying at an AirBnB above a restaurant that had an outdoor area and a little garage-type party room, so we gathered there in the afternoon. Angus was recovered, but his friend whose parents had flown in from California was down for the count until after dinner. They had all missed rehearsal, so we told them to find someone who had been sober to follow the next day. Angus said he wasn't going to drink anymore, but then somehow everyone ended up doing homemade limoncello shots.

We got one final picture with Angus and Jack, who we called Fake Angus for the first two years because they were the only two freshmen with full beards and when their hair was the same length they were indistinguishable on the baseball diamond - we had to tell my mom to stop waving at Jack multiple times. 

Everyone made it to commencement on time, and the ceremony was lovely. It was outside in a gorgeous space that was too sunny for any amount of sunscreen we could slather on our pasty Canadian skins. Eve got a major tan/burn line quite high on her chest that has hampered her ability to wear low-cut tops since, leading her to profess than she "should have dressed sluttier at Angus's grad".

all the baseball players who came in as freshmen together

Angus had to move out of his room right after grad - we went up and grabbed a few things to put in our car, and a couple of high school friends who had driven down to see him graduate helped him load the rest into his car.

I still think that Covid made the middle two years of his four-year experience sort of squish together so it feels faster than it would have otherwise, but I realize it probably would have seemed fast anyway. On the whole, he had a really good experience and I think he grew a lot. 

I don't want to end on a schmaltzy note, so enjoy this picture taken right after Lucy, who had also been nervous about the weather all day, took a massive leap onto Eve, who was both impressed by the acrobatics and unimpressed by the result.

Surly Thursday

It's been a while since I had a full head of surliness to vent on the appropriate day. None of it is really that bad, and none of it is really personal, and mostly I think I might have been intractably, irredeemably cranky today anyway.

1. I have a sleep study booked tonight to check whether my CPAP settings need to be adjusted. In a way I'm glad it's happening because it needs to happen. In a way it's one more fucking medical test in a line of the blood pressure-monitoring-mammogram-biopsy-bloodwork train over the last month that makes me think maybe I wouldn't be feeling so mortal right now if I could go a few days in a row without being reminded of all the things that might be about to kill me. Also, I was so proud of myself that when they called to schedule they said 'how about Wednesday night'? and I said I only actually have to be at work two days a week, maybe it could not be the night before one of those days? and they said sure! Thursday night? and I said great! And just as I hung up realized I had agreed to take an office shift at Broadview on Friday, after a night of unsettled interrupted sleep. Dumb.

2. I agreed to take this office shift even thought I've been really enjoying just being a librarian again, and it's at the school that's far from my house, and I haven't done any office shifts there so I won't really know what's going on. The office administrator wanted the afternoon off for her son's high school graduation. She suggested I stop in at some point before the shift so she could give me some pointers. Every time I have, she's been on the phone and too busy, or not there. I emailed her about this. She never got back to me or came up to the library to see me. I'm the one doing her a favour, should I be the one jumping through all the hoops? I don't even know if I have a login for the attendance software. It will be fine, there will be a time after this, I will survive, I'm just annoyed.

3. Working the last month of the school year in the library is an exercise in trying to go with the flow. EQAO happens, immunizations happen, big meetings happen, and this seems to inevitably result in the library bookshelves being moved around in weird ways and groups of people being constantly in the way. I can't reach the shelves I need to reach. The shelves aren't alphabetical anymore so I'm wandering around like an idiot with the same book for way longer than I should be. Compared to being a teacher this is absolutely nothing to complain about that, and I realize that, and I would never complain about it anywhere other than here.

4. While we're on the subject of the teachers, though, ninety percent of them could not be lovelier and I love seeing them when they bring their kids in and I respect and admire their work so much. But there is a small subset of them who think that the librarian is their inferior and that they should be able to set up shop in the library whenever they feel like it, and block the aisles with their little carts and lean on the very shelves on which I am trying to replace the books, and holy fuck, who the fuck does that? 

5. Motherfucker, I actually have to sleep at the hospital tonight. How did I do this last time? Did I bring a fan? I'm definitely going to need a fan. It says arrive with clean, dry, product-free hair. Ha ha ha, bitch, this hair doesn't go anywhere without product. The last time I went they said "we might wake you up to try a machine, but don't worry if we don't, you might still have sleep apnea". Then it took me forever to fall asleep and then they woke me up going JESUS CHRIST your brain is getting zero oxygen, PUT THIS MASK ON. And then it took me forever to fall asleep again because, mask. Presumably it should be a bit better this time, but not that much better because, hospital. Ugggggghhhhhhhhhh.

6. Some guy on Facebook made a gross comment about the little girl play Princess Leia in the new Star Wars series and I said it was gross and he said I looked like John Goodman with a mop on his head. Okay, that doesn't actually make me surly, I can't stop giggling about it. I almost said "thanks, that's what I was going for", but I thought it was better to cut off his oxygen. Still. Of all the ways I've ever been called fat by fuckwads on the internet, that was peak creative. 

Thank-you for indulging my crabbiness. I will endeavour to be more pleasant when next we meet.