I’m so tired.
I regret all the times I said I was tired pre-quarantine. Just like, after having children, I regretted all the times I’d said I was tired before having them.
Because now, as then, I’m experiencing a new kind of tiredness. A new level of exhaustion. I’ve been left wondering if I’m iron-deficient, or have a serious illness. I struggle through runs that used to be…if not easy, then doable, feeling as though I’m wearing ankle weights. I can’t seem to get enough sleep, the alarm set pre-COVID giving way to lingering in bed and an anger over having to leave it. I feel breathless walking up stairs.
I am so tired.
And I’d be more worried, if 1) I had space for more worry; and 2) everyone around me weren’t saying the same thing. They’re so tired too, except for the Instagram overachievers who’ve gone public with all their PRs, but my “they” refers to the people around me, the ones who nod their heads slowly, The Husband commiserating over his own shitty runs; another daily presence commiserating over her own panic attacks and inability to switch from a 6 am wakeup to an even later one without feeling drained.
And who knows, maybe I do need more iron (talk to me about leafy greens right now at your own peril), but I definitely know this: there is a weight upon me that wasn’t there before; and maybe a weight that was there, but that I was distracted from feeling.
Homeschool (distance learning, whatever) starts back tomorrow. I want to punch something just writing that. I am angry about being my children’s teacher, their alternating slavedriver and saviour from it, pushing for completion one minute and throwing my arms up in an “F it all” pose the next (consistency can shove it right now). There is the weight of being a newly-minted, unqualified teacher of two grades and the awareness that comes with it of all they have to learn–to be taught–and the one–me–apparently responsible for that. It’s too much. It’s too heavy.
And then there are the weights that I was distracted from feeling; the awarenesses that didn’t register because I was moving too fast. There are no distractions now from my own chaotic mind, from my own anxiety and introspection. Life used to have a baseline of movement: daily walks, twice over, to the boys’ school, pilgrimages into the world, travels. Now stillness is life’s point of reference: we’re always either at, or headed, home. And home–stillness–for all its noise, is quieter.
Social media still exists, so plenty of us are still adept at evading ourselves and any self-awareness a lengthy interaction with our “selves” can bring. But I’m meeting the unavoidable-for-me beast head on: I am my own observer. I see myself wanting to use online retail therapy to feel better. I see myself noticing, more, how alcohol affects my sleep (and my runs, and my moods) and I have to figure out what to do about that. How food does the same.
I see how I have to be my own advocate, even while caring for others. How an introvert must claim space or go insane–or at least into a panic attack. How I have to send my regrets to some Zoom meetings because that is space I need for myself right now, at a time when we are all so surrounded by each other, in this house at least. How meditation–and by that I simply mean being in the present moment, without judgment, for more than five seconds–is essential. How prayer is oxygen. How humour is a life raft. How books for me, and iPads for the kids, have to happen. How saying NO to the voices that chant “Do more! Make this time count!” is not just self-care, but wisdom itself.
“Every man rushes elsewhere into the future because no man has arrived at himself,” wrote Michel de Montaigne, who is quoted in the book my friend gave me, which has been its own lifeline. And what’s funny and perfect about right now? WE HAVE NO FUTURE TO RUSH INTO! SO WE CAN EITHER RUN IN CIRCLES OR INTO OURSELVES. Sarah Wilson, the author of said book, says about de Montaigne: “He shared through his writing that freedom from the restlessness in our beings could only be achieved by actively resisting the pull outwards and into the future, and instead learning to ‘stay at home’.”
Ha. #stayathome.
On the way back from our daily trip to the beach this morning, the boys asked to hear “My Shot,” and as the familiar tune reached my ears, I thought for a second something was wrong, then realised that no, my phone hadn’t somehow slowed down the tempo. It was always at that speed. Everything feels slow right now, because I’m trying to speed it up. I am being called to stillness. To my family. To myself. And to the grace that waits there.