It’s been a long time since I jumped out of bed at the sound of my alarm and said, “Hello, morning. It’s good to be alive!” Rather than celebrate another glorious day of existence, the best I can do is offer up a string of encouragements, hoping my engine will eventually turn over: You can do it. Just put your feet on the floor. One at a time–ew, watch out for the dog turd (midnight gift left by geriatric Lab). Now go pee and get yourself a cup of coffee. There we go. That’s it. Good job, Sylvia. If I’m really lucky, my husband is up readying the French press so there’s no delay in delivering caffeine to my bloodstream. Which I do immediately. And then repeat.
I’m tired. It’s been a rough year. Two new schools, endless transition, a new diagnosis for my son, loss of a friend, menopause. Did I say menopause? It’s not that I’m assuming everyone else is throwing back their covers and sailing into the day with a song in their heart and a skip in their stride. I get that modern life is (by definition) hard and that most people, young and old, are dealing with their own version of rough. It’s just that my rough seems to have gotten the better of me. As in a full-blown meltdown. In public.
My day was going pretty well. Out the door early, minimal conflict with children and spouse, lighter than normal traffic. I got to my workspace and focused hard–accomplishing several hours of solid writing–which left me enough time to bang off a list of errands before heading back to the valley for school carpools. My most important stop was the pediatrician to pick up a prescription, which I do every month. Street parking wasn’t an option, so I headed underground to the valet. I get a ticket from the machine, proceed into the garage, pull up behind a notably long line of cars, leave my keys in the cup holder and, with a nod to the attendant, race inside. It takes me about four minutes to ride the elevator to the 8th floor, grab the waiting script from the receptionist, ride back down and return to the checkout. In fact, the whole effort was so fast I was amazed by the synchronicity of it all. Someone give this girl a gold star…she is killing her to-do list! I don’t even bother to pull out my wallet because I know the attendant won’t charge for anything under ten minutes. Again, I do this every month. But on this particular day, distracted by my manic pace and my profound weariness, I lose the stupid parking ticket.
“Sorry, lady. It’s 40 bucks.”
“What? I’m not paying you 40 bucks. You haven’t even parked my car. It’s still sitting in the line waiting to be moved.”
“Forty bucks. It’s policy—“
“Look, I am not paying you 40 bucks. Under any circumstance.”
“Lady. It’s the rule. You lose the ticket, you pay–“
“Well, I’m not pay-ing. So you’d better get the tippity-top person over here, your number one, whoever it is that makes the decisions, because—“
“Lady—“
“NOT TODAY! Don’t you get what I’m saying? It’s the WRONG day, and I will not be paying 40 dollars. IT’S. NOT. HAPPENING.”
At which point he walks away to find someone who will convince me to pay the 40 bucks. At which point I run to my car with keys still inside, make a 12-point turn out of the line and squeal towards the exit.
To say that I’d lost all sense of decorum is accurate. I was sweating, panicked, ranting, and would probably have busted all Thelma-and-Louise style through that gate had one of the parking guys observing the scene not run over and swiped his magic get-out-of-jail key card to assist in my escape. Somehow he got it. He knew I would not be paying the 40 bucks. That I was incapable of paying the 40 bucks. That my fragile state required an act of grace, an infusion of kindness, a noble solution, and not a stubborn confrontation and a stiff fine. In short, he knew rough. And so I drove through the gate–barely able to utter a thank you to him as I passed—up into the daylight, where I promptly pulled over to the side of the road and burst into tears. Sobbing for having lost my shit. For being so very tired. For waking up every morning and feeling dread rather than joy.
Brene Brown says that joy needs nurturing, and the primary way to do this is by practicing gratitude. You must seek it out every day, even in the smallest of ways. Define it. Speak it. Over and over until it sticks, like flossing or eating soluble fiber or stretching or saying please and thank you. You do this every day until joy becomes a habit; until joy, literally, becomes a part of you. She also urges us to speak our shame so we might discover and preserve our vulnerability. Which, for the record, is the point of this tale. That and a preventative measure to save face. Because let’s be real, those parking garages are loaded with cameras.
