48. the towel

Tonight I am throwing in the towel. 

It’s literally 3 past midnight, and I am sitting on the couch with River, who refuses to go to bed. Of course, he also won’t let me write. 

So this is it tonight: If this is for me, and I am beyond tired, then at some point I just need to give up and give in. 

I am fuming, actually, furiously angry at this small child who won’t go to sleep. I’m fed up with parenting all the fucking time. It never ends. 

I’m sick of not having a babysitter, someone to step in and help so we can just have a few hours without constantly parenting. 

I’m mad about being mad, because obviously my child is more important than my perfectionistic pursuit of daily writing, but how THE FUCK did an entire day go by, from 7am until midnight, and it’s not been possible for me to have a few minutes to myself to get my thoughts from my fiery burning heart onto the page? 

The only reason I’m typing even now is that Brent heard me frustrated and angry with River, so came out to save the day. 

Which makes me mad, too, because now he’s the hero and I’m the bad guy who lost my patience with my three year old. 

I’m just so tired. There’s no creativity in this, there’s no beauty in this, there’s not even any boundaries in this. My words of the year are lost and floating out in the ethers, I’m closing my night with a pointless email to meet some arbitrary standard that I set for myself, and honestly I’m angry about that, too. It’s day 4 of my cycle and I haven’t had a single day of proper rest, and I’m angry about that too. 

Fuck this towel. I’d like to throw it as far as I possibly could. But I fling it with all my might, and it just flops on the floor two feet away from me.

That’s what this email feels like. 

I’m throwing in the towel. Fuck this towel.

Tomorrow is another day. 

Good - fucking - night.