With a child prone to depression, a good day is such a good day. Everything seems brighter, when your kid is doing well. If we get a couple good days in a row I start to relax enough to remember how different life once was. It reminds me there were many years where every day, both my kids were in this space.
It’s tempting to let the moods of my kids, or the mood of my husband, reframe my day. It’s difficult to just have my day.
My son sleeps until the mid-afternoon; if I have a client over to try on a garment, I’ve got to rustle him out of the downstairs bedroom first into his own room. Most of my clients are women with their guard down and don’t mind disrobing and don’t mind who else is in my home, by way of children, when they do it. The other day while helping a woman with a dress she kept hauling it up to look back and forth, exposing her plain cotton panties unselfconsciously; I guess we’re kind of friends now.
But back to my kids. In the afternoon Nels’ hair in a tangle on the pillow, like the Leonard Cohen song. My son is tall, only a couple inches shorter than I. His long, beautiful brown foot out from under the comforter. Later: “I am just so hungry!” he tells me cheerily, as he brings forth an elaborate plate of food to the coffee table. His life consists of sleeping, doing a bit of housework (happily!), playing outside and ringleading, and then gaming – making videos and uploading them. About now, around midnight, I start trying to wrangle him to shower and then sleep or at least towards it. Phee is usually upstairs on a Discord server with friends; they watch movies at night while Phee draws.
My work schedule has been intense; I’m also trying to get my tailoring business all above board and tidied up with itself. Learning about scheduling software, invoicing, filing. I had plans for a few projects this year but time, and the mundane business of earning money, is slipping quickly by.
No matter what though I I do my thing, my volunteer avocation: hanging out with other addicts. Trying to help. Tonight I dropped a c-bomb in a meeting and thought, Whoops. Too harsh. At least for some people. I’m thinking though that I need to carve out a tiny bit more space, have a place I can be a little more open, a little more abrasive.
Tonight Phee is in bed early; good. They’ll get a lot more sleep before school tomorrow.
Tonight I am really glad to be alive because not everyone gets this opportunity, and certainly none of us do for very long.