I am tired. I realized this last night as I was laying in the tub, contemplating my general lack of grooming and pondering how glaringly apparent my general drain was to the casual passerby. 

I pictured the conversation, or the just the general acceptance and acknowledgement that accompanies the inevitability of middle aged sag and drag.

I mean, we all age, and we all have times of fatigue, of even exhaustion.

But if I was to bargain on my effect I might go closer to “wrecked”.

I am a little wrecked. And I am guessing it is the worse kept secret I have.

But what do you do. (If you say sleep, you get a slap, sleep is obvious, and sometimes easier to obtain than others)

I mean, I am not talking about “last night I had insomnia” or “I got to bed a little late last night” tired.
I am talking about that feeling when the cup is light and the lake is far far away.

If you say “me time” you get another slap. 

I have noticed people who tell people to “be more selfish” or “take a little me time” are often the people afforded  a wealth of it. Single or childless, seldom impoverished, and if overworked, usually in a career for their own advancement. All me time, just different brands of me: career me, sun n fun me, night on the town me, domestic surprise me. Change the accessories, variate on the level of general decompression, but “me” time is bullshit, and the power of selfishness has its limits. 

And in the end I am not that interesting, and the variant on me time is: time for my loved ones, who share pedestal. I guess they mean find a time when the people who matter the most matter less. This isn’t always a luxury I have without increasing my own unhappiness, in a round about way.

Besides, most people lives lives of eternal obligation. They have dependents and deadlines and bills and production. It is the very nature of existence to produce and consume, in varying cycles.

The key is in the how, not the what. Not in how much of you you put ahead or behind or in the middle, but how you feel about your place and how you can find peace and relaxation in the equation.

Because my experience is that escapism can work, but the pursuit of it just becomes another goal, and those are exhausting. Better to integrate, with intentionality, the process in which the things that drain you are experienced so that they might also invigorate you.

Paradox for descriptive purpose:

Parenting is exhausting. For a variety of reasons ranging from being constantly on point, to being generally overly emotionally engaged, to little details like sleep deprivation and actually picking up physical humans when you would rather sit on your ass.

Parenting is also incredibly emotionally rewarding. The emotional feedback is great and it expands point and purpose in an exponential fashion and suddenly grocery stores are an adventure.

Things that are emotionally rewarding help produce relaxation and zen and joy, except the same thing produces exhaustion.

Rinse lather repeat.

The devil is in the details.

I guess the point is this: I have no idea what to do, because a bit like depression, the bottom of the well is harder to see out of, and when you are drained, that is where you are at. It might be cool and lovely and away the damn hot sun but it is also cold and far away from the very thing that warms your soul, and it makes it harder to see all the reasons you are there in the first place, and damnit, here is the rain, but I could use a floaty. It is all a blessing, and I will rise to the top somehow, by bucket or by floatation device or by treading water or clawing my way to the top. I know this, but at the moment I just don’t know the mechanism and that is the scariest part of all.

So, I guess my point is: this is a bitch session. And nothing more. 

You can’t help because you don’t know what I need because I don’t know what I need.

Other than things to be easier. 

And I just hope I don’t look as old as I feel.