hold it in your mind like a cat’s cradle I would like to remind you now of what your morning self seems to have failed to impress on you: that relaxing your sense of obligation to cover up the mundane tracks on the beach of your mind with branches and leaves of what you suppose to be “intellectual” or “interesting” is permissible; that your fifteen minutes really can be “anything that isn't nonsense.” I don’t want the stupid thing popping up. iA wins over Uly in the area of less extraneous bullshit to fuck with. For pure typing, it still comes out ahead, even though Uly has a better typewriter mode (maybe) and other niceties; iA just has non-personalizable (beyond the *very* basics) words on a blank screen. In Uly, I can’t get rid of the stupid word suggestion pop-up at the bottom, even when I’m using my bluetooth keyboard. Or if there is a way to do it, that’s just one more thing to waste time figuring out. And going in and out of full screen vs. library seems more complicated too; again, maybe not, in a way; they probably have a keyboard shortcut, but then that’s a thing I have to learn and remember and who knows. It just seems like every. single. time. there’s always just these odd little annoyances about Uly. I always want to like it and use it; it seems so slick. But it always ends up driving me crazy by a thousand little ant bites. Not that that matters. What does matter? Things that are right in front of my face? Like mom just sent me money to help with the trip. Are you fucking serious? Am I going to bleed her financially until she’s literally dead? I mean, to be fair, I didn’t ask her; she just always volunteers and I don’t say no. Still. I’d like to be in a position to be able to say no, and still make all the trips we make. I guess I could; we’d just have to be a lot more careful and probably have a little less fun. But seriously, am I just so habituated? Even if I totally had, no question, enough to say no, would I? Or am I like a depression baby; instinctually grasping, saving, storing, taking advantage of any opportunity. Obviously I’m not like a depression baby in terms of frugality and hard common sense. I’m more of a.... what.... not exactly millenial.... not sure what it is. Are other late-gen-X’ers like me? I can’t be that unique. Everybody wants to have a category to explain their shortcomings, right? Is it ADHD for me? I flirted with it, don’t really believe it even though we’re supposed to be all open-minded about such things now. I guess I don’t know enough to know whether ADHD should be called a disorder, a disease, or just a conveniently bundled set of loosely-agreed-upon traits that can stand in for almost anything that we woulda used to call being a fucking slacker or loser or spaz or basket case. I mean, ultimately, unless you’re using it to get drugs, forgiveness, extra help, easier tests, or sympathy, what’s the difference? Kids use “autistic” nowadays the way they used to use “retarded”--as a self-aggradizement-by-comparison insult. You can’t make that shit go away by changing the words. It’s word whack-a-mole. You’re fighting an abstraction that’s beside the point. Fight for all people to have rights and be treated fairly, whether they’re a retarded basket case or not. You know? It’s really that simple. That’s it. That’s the answer. There. I’ve solved it for you. There are no nuances that need be discussed. All we have to do is stop doing this one thing, and start doing this other thing. Elect me; I’ve got it all figgered out. FUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUCK YOOOOOOOOOUUUUUUUU!!!!!!!!!! OK, but seriously. Sailboats of paper at the edge of the office sea. Fragments. Attention wanders. But not *to* anywhere; it just wanders. Got a lot of grading to do. Will there be a semester where there’s no days or weeks when I’m thinking, is this it? Is this the time the complaints bubble over the top and I get officially reprimanded? Or fired for, you know, not doing my job? Why the fuck do I play this game? Why do I flirt with death? Not because it’s titillating, really; it’s mostly a drag. It’s like voluntarily bringing back the softball ache that used to taint my weekends with the inevitability of going back to gym class on Monday. Why would I invite such a low background dread into my days? Seems dumb. Real dumb. No rational mentally healthy person would do that on purpose, so it follows that I got some kind of disease or disorder. What should we call it? How about ADHD. Or something. Or basket-case-itis. FUUUUUUUUU----- the sparrow that angled into the room from an open solar panel oomphed into my chest, knocking the Hey so I missed my own tutorial today because I was at the dentist and I totally forgot or avoided or didn’t bother telling anyone that was going to happen, but instead of emails asking, “Where were you” and having to exempt them from another one because it was my fault, I got an email from one of my students who I didn’t even know was this awesome who said basically, yeah, I took over, here’s how everyone did; and not only that but she said “maybe they felt more relaxed, like they weren’t being judged or something” WHich is totally fucking rad; she wins; I gotta let her know that; she saved my ass and I suspect she knows that, and I hope she doesn’t have ZERO respect for me as a teacher because of realizing that obviously she’s better at this shit than I am, but also, wait, what? Does that mean they *do* feel judged when I *am* there? Because I totally thought I was good at not giving off that vibe. I thought that was one of my main strengths! Is it not? If not, then what does that mean? That I got to break some shit down that I had built up in my mind I guess; that I got to undergo a little bit of that wound me, cut me, make me sick so that I can regrow with a new head; a little bit of that throw me off on purpose, sweep the leg; go down; figure out how to roll out of it; laugh but don’t just laugh it off