On the way home, I had to drop something in the mail, and I also ran to the bank - I had the small check my co-worker on feeding the college student minstry wrote me (we split the cost of the food and what I bought was more than what she bought).
On the way home, I thought: I should either go to the Pruett's Foods or the Wal-mart. I am getting low on milk (which only the Wal-mart has the kind I use) and I need something new and different for dinner and I need a few other things, and Saturday is out for shopping because of the wildflower program.
But I couldn't. I had forgot - I always forget, not having kids - that between about 2:45 and 4 pm it's ridiculous to try to get anywhere near Pruett's, or to try to get out to the wal-mart, because school is letting out.
No, it's not the school buses. It's parents picking up their kids. They block the intersections, they try to angle other people out. And yes, some of those are likely parents having to get kids to soccer/baseball/music lessons/dance/Choctaw lessons/whatever. But some of it, I know - from having heard people talk - is parents who don't want their child riding the bus.
My first reaction was irritation: I wish when I was a kid my parents thought I was special enough that I shouldn't have to ride the bus. But my parents wanted me to be "tough," and in the 1970s parents didn't pick their kids up from school, and they probably also didn't realize how bad the bus was.
But really: I don't blame the parents. The buses, if they are like when I was a kid, are awful. A lot of the abuse (mostly but not entirely verbal) I suffered at the hands of my peers happened on the bus. I was prevented from sitting down - even though it probably broke some law for the driver to drive with me standing - because no one wanted me to sit with them.
Yeah, I hated the bus and I don't blame parents for wanting to shield their kids from that.
But it still makes it harder for people like me. So I came home, threw in a load of laundry, am doing Duolingo, might do piano practice in a bit, and then, if I have energy, I will go back out around 4:30.
But it irritates me that I have to do it like that. I would really prefer to get my errands run, come home, take off my shoes, and be done with the day. But it doesn't work like that any more.
I do also have to get to the local gourmet shop (one of the few small businesses that still exists in town) and see if there's anything good to go with the potholders I made my mom for Mother's Day and I know I'm running short on time here but it's so hard, at 3 pm or later, to find the energy to.
I still feel kind of sad and tired. And a lot of things going on, a lot of the miasma circulating in the news, it just gets me down. And part of this is: a lot of what's wrong in our culture right now is people feel not-heard, and people are acting out in strange and bad ways because they want to be heard. And the truth is, that's the illusion of social media and YouTube and all that junk: there's the illusion that not only will you be heard, you will be loved, and you will be paid for what you have to say. (It's the new lottery. I used to say, bitterly, that lawsuits were sometimes seen as the "new lottery," but I think monetizing something online and being a "content provider" is seen as the "new lottery" now).
And in truth: 90% of people, historically, were probably never "heard" at all. And probably 99.99999999999% were not "heard" outside their own family. (And of course, you have "non-family households" - to use the ugly Census term - like me, where there's literally no one to hear you). But social media has changed that perception.
And don't get me wrong: I love blogging and I love Twitter in a lot of ways, and it makes me feel good that sometimes I post a stupid thing on there (today a comment about "It's got what plants crave") and a bunch of my mutuals on there like what I said, and even two of them tweeted back at me a .gif of someone from "Idiocracy" making that comment, and I feel like the tribe I so desperately desired when I was a tween actually does exist, it's just that they're scattered all across the world* and while that's maybe a little sad (that I can't hang out with them in person) it's better than nothing.
But still: I do think the Internet and social media bring out bad and difficult things in a lot of people. I suspect I've become more of a little-n narcissist as a result of it. I don't think it's affected me badly enough to make me quit it, but I can see that I look harder for "validation" than I once did.
(*I think of a card I saw eons ago, when I was like 12 or so - it was one of those "comic" cards that has a little sting in the tail, where on the front it said something like "Don't despair! There's someone out there for everyone!" and on the inside, it said, "Unfortunately, your 'someone' is a ten-year-old cowherder in New Delhi." I never forgot that because it made me sad to think of it, and a lot during my growing up years I wondered if maybe that was how "soulmates" worked, seeing as I never found mine)
But yeah. I wish I had been able to get to the grocery and had found some nice and relatively quick-fix idea for dinner and could just take my shoes and hose and bra off and relax and think about finishing up the binding on the quilt and maybe look forward to a warm bath.....
All that said, I started following Mr. T on Twitter. (Yes, that Mr. T). He met the First Lady of France and has spoken very admiringly of her, and I have to admit it sort of warms my heart a little that Mr. T apparently has a little crush on the First Lady of France. (Oh, would that I had someone who felt like that about me....)
Edited to add:
Note to self: DO NOT GO TO WAL-MART IN THE AFTERNOON AFTER SCHOOL HAS LET OUT.
I saw: a preteen girl trying to take a cell phone photo of her (evasive) brother, their shenanigans blocked the entire aisle and their mom seemed totally ignorant of that fact
A kid running down another aisle, bouncing a ball as he went. I had to dodge to get out of his way.
A pack of high-school kids slowly roaming the aisles and blocking them.
(You might sense a theme. I am one of those "I want to get in, find my stuff, pay, and scram" people and I don't like having to negotiate around people who are 4x slower than me for no good reason (I cut much slack for elderly people or people using some kind of assistive device but they are usually not aisle-blockers in the way those kids were)
I did get 75 watt-equivalent LED bulbs, which will be better in the sewing-chair lamp. And I got a gallon and a half of organic milk, which should hold me for a while.
I ran past the toy aisle in the hopes of finding a fun cool Barbie dress for the new girl (Who I think IS named Cinnamon, with "Cinny" as a nickname) but there was NOTHING I liked - a few sets with ugly colors and a few one-piece things (Hello Kitty or Minions themed tops).
So my "fluster" was a couple of those cheap chocolate eggs with Ponies.
Unfortunately, I got twin Twilights:
Standard comment: If you really want a wee tiny Twilight (these are about 1" long), e-mail me. I think one of the littlest puffy envelopes would work for this.
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