Teaching while on the Spectrum might look like mainlining cocaine or speed
Yet it’s really anxiety-soaked adrenaline pushing daily seven-hour manic states
Come home, crash, weekend cries until the shakes stop but sleep never comes
A decade of internal doubt, of constant failure, fear of being seen as a liability
The job is important. Science must be taught with conviction rivaling zealotry
While a world shuts down borders and free thought, reason and medicine
Threadbare hope, grains of success not measurable during observations
Motivate with all the optimism and joy in the tank, leaving nothing for thyself
5.4.20 - #coronavirus2020 VIII
I miss my wife. I hate it when she’s gone.
Sounds like the lines of a country-western song.
She’s on the road with the girl, again. I’m alone
On the couch, eating feelings and worrying about
All that might go wrong. Even the dog is gone.
Before she left, she hugged me tight and whispered,
“I promise to keep this marriage safe.”
Even though I don’t want to, I wonder,
The inner demons start to play
I worry that she’d rather be in other company
Though she’s the one who begged me to stay.
I want to believe her so bad, I need to
What other choice do I have?
I love her, let her lie, let her go, live a lie?
We hope for something better to grow
Dressed the wounds and sank down below
Layers of sheets and tree, fog and breeze
Even if it hurts, even if it’s the worst outcome
Of a million ways I can see our story going
At least for me, it was worth it to know
Love deep enough to get hurt, live through it
Do no wrong, try to pass no judgment
Tell them you love them, though the hurt shows
Be a better man, do the best you can
Let them know you love them, every time they go.
Anyone else scared out of their mind about how bad it’s gonna be by June? Asian killer bees, a likely explosion of pandemic cases in Georgia. People out like everything’s fine, not wearing masks. In a few weeks… Jesus. It worries me. Seems like the worst possible sci-fi plot.
I think my money is now on “Rushed Vaccine Causes Zombification,” at this point. Or we go to war with China over the lie of who manufactured the virus? That puts the Red Dawn scenario at play. But I’m lucky, able to arm-chair speculate from the relative safety of a back porch. Crickets are in the background. Some people aren’t so lucky. The virus is ravaging minorities at a savagely disproportionate rate, evidence of a medical system in need of desperate and complete reform.
Maybe it’s the fatalist in me, but I’m trying to make sure I tell my family I love them. Even when things hurt. Even when they hurt.
4.19.20 - #corona2020 VII
A bed under my head, a roof o’er my feet
Cold fear, a fine mist o’er empty streets
Alone, grieving in stained pajama sheets
Wondering if the end it was a virus that led
To a half-remembered phrase, prophecy
Worn couches masquerade as deathbeds
Lives spent streaming, WiFi, windows shuttered
How worlds end, not in bangs, but whispers