Just when I thought I got away with a pleasant Monday start to my week, Tuesday hits like a derailed Amtrack.
If only I had seen the signs... I would've known that Tuesday meant trouble. My younger sister was in court due to a recently confiscated fake i.d., and the reason that this has anything to do with me can be best described as a tangled web of bank accounts, living in the same city, and out-of-state tuition. After a pleasantly-excruciating yoga class (take my advice, don't quit for six months and expect it to be fun again when you start back up), I spent the rest of Monday night transferring funds for her and running to the ATM in my pajamas.
The next thing I know, my four (no joke) morning alarms are going off to the tune of various ringtones, and voila! it's Tuesday. When I hop out of the shower it's barely 7:30 a.m. and I notice a missed call on my cell, which is vibrating itself off the table. In my mind, I assume my mother is calling to remind me to take it easy on my sister this morning. So without listening to the message, I decide to humor her fictitious request.
As I run out the door, my sister calls and asks me to grab a pair of black slacks she has stuffed in my closet. Good girl, I think. Maybe she has a shot at getting out of this mess after all. Sadly, all is lost when I pick her up on campus. She takes one look in the back seat, and yells, "Black flats, Lindsey! I said, bring me a pair of black shoes." Seizing the opportunity to verbally slap her ungrateful behind, I tell her to change anyway, the black pants would look much better.
On the way to work, I have a chance to listen to my voicemail, and the tone is surprisingly unpleasant. In fact, news of my supposed "difficult" behavior from the night before (going to yoga instead of directly to the bank) has already traveled 1,132 miles and back again before my coffe-craving brain has time to process what's happening. What's happening (8:10 a.m.) is that I'm being "not yelled at" for not being helpful enough to my sister in her time of stress and need. If you ask me, stress and need sounds a little bit more like tough-shit and caught-red-handed.
I arrive at the office feeling frazzled, and before I can sit down I get a phone call to tell me that I have ten minutes to ensure a missing $40,000 finds its way into our client's checking account. Unable to close on a new house without the check, my coworker and I have zero time to solve the problem and a mess of red tape to navigate. The rest of the morning and early afternoon is lost in what can best be described as a flurry of phone calls, faxes, frustration, and eventual blackout. When I come to my senses, it's late afternoon.
Gripping a Starbucks iced double-shot, I sit down at 3 p.m. to check my gmail. By the time I read my daily horoscope, I can already tell you what it says. "You may not want to come out of your shell today, but circumstances make it difficult to stay quiet..." More like, circumstances make it difficult to avoid everyone by calling in sick, turning off my phone, and staying in bed all day.
By the time I'm off work, I'm feeling so desperate for two hours of alone time at the gym that I end up falling asleep in the sauna after a long run. Relaxed and well-deserving of a bottle of my favorite wine, I am seconds from home-free when I notice a text from a friend who wants grab dinner. Could I possibly make it? I ask myself. No way, no how tonight. Half passed-out, I text an apology.
Two hours ago, I walked through the door of my apartment, poured myself a fat glass of wine, and collapsed on the couch. Netflicks delivered Platoon last week and I've been avoiding it on my coffee table. What's better than a classic war movie to put a bad day in perspective?
During the first scene, I got another text from my friend saying that "we need to talk soon ...and address the ambiguities in our relationship." I smile to myself, and think, what a perfect ending to a day where everyone needs some sort of answer from me.
touche. truse.
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