Category — Uncategorized

I subscribe to Mindful, and curiously clicked when a post came up this week promising to help me tell the difference between a bad day and burnout.  (Though, before I clicked, I sang to myself, “Maybe she’s born with it.  Maybe it’s Maybelline.”  Because that’s what I always sing to myself when articles present me with two possibilities.)

I walked away not knowing if it’s a bad day or burnout because I am always a pessimist.  That’s my default outlook.  And it didn’t give me enough to go on to distinguish regular tired from burnout tired.  Still, it jogged the question in my brain; what am I feeling right now?

I am going through a hard streak.  During a hard streak, everything just feels hard.  I feel like I’m waiting on too many things and no one is getting back to me.  My insecurity is high and my output is low.  My imposter syndrome is berating me even when all I’m doing is pulling together a peanut butter and jam sandwich.  (“You think you’re a good sandwich maker?  Everyone can tell your sandwiches are sub-par.  You’re not fooling anyone.”)

When I’m in a hard streak, I rationally know that hard streaks are followed (at some point) by easy streaks where everything slips easily into place.  Where I get a dozen affirmative answers all at once and good surprises fall into my lap.  I get my work done early and have a relaxing reading day.  There are meals at the ready in the freezer.  My to do list checkboxes are checked.

Or they’re followed by neutral streaks that feel like easy streaks in comparison to the hard streaks.  Where every day pretty much meets expectations.  And while nothing particularly exciting is happening, I know what I need to do when I wake up every morning, and I accomplish it by the time I go to bed.  And I count that as a good day.  Those times are not as fun as the easy streaks where life keeps giving me green lights, but I’m okay with neutral.

I guess I’m okay with anything other than a hard streak.

This week, I needed to run errands.  I didn’t want to run errands because I’m cognizant that I’m currently in a hard streak, which means even errands end up being difficult.  And these did not disappoint.  A task that should have taken 15 minutes was dragged out over two hours due to malfunctioning equipment and human error.  I ran into the pet store, and the pet store was not only out of bedding but would not be getting any in for a week.  I ran into the grocery store and they were out of the soup I needed for dinner.  The Wolvog offered to pick me up something at Starbucks as a treat, but I told him it was too risky.  During a hard streak, it was likely that I would spill the drink on myself vs. get it into my mouth.  He nodded and ordered a hot chocolate for himself without comment.

The problem with hard streaks is that you need to press through them.  You can’t hit pause and wait for them to be over or the work will pile up and you’ll never be on the other side of the streak.  So you plug away and peek up at the figurative traffic lights of life, hoping they’ll change to green.

It was a throwaway line in an Anthony Horowitz book, but I jumped onto Google to see if it was a real thing.  Do people really host Death Cafes?

Yes, they do.

The idea is that you get together with other people for a social event where you discuss your thoughts on death, wishes for your remains, your fears.  There is a format, recommended questions, and always cake.  (The cake thing came up in every piece of literature I found about Death Cafes.  Apparently cake is part of the process.)  The goal is to treat the end of life in the same way we treat the beginning of life, with great thought given to the process instead of sticking our heads in the sand.

It made me think about a part in Tig Notaro’s book I’m Just a Person.  Her mother is dying, and her friend Maxine comes to sit with Tig in the hospital.  She writes on page 103.

A year later, Maxine would reveal that she had wanted to take a photo of my mother that day, because she felt like even that moment was a part of my mother’s story, and she wanted me to have a picture of it because every moment of my mother’s life was important. And I would have loved to have that photo, but I know my mother wouldn’t have wanted a picture of herself taken when she was in that condition — no matter how good her skin looked.

A long time ago, people only took pictures after death because photographs were so expensive, so certainly, there was precedence.  Why do we take so many photos at a birth, but we don’t take any photos to mark a death, another moment in a life?

I dread specific deaths, and admit that I don’t like to think too deeply about people I love not being here anymore.  But I do think it’s important to think and speak hypothetically about death.  To treat it as part of a life in the same way that we talk about other milestones.

I scanned the offerings in my area on the Death Cafe site, and there were a few popping up in the next few weeks.  But I felt reluctant to go talk about this with strangers.  With friends and family, absolutely.  But I’m not great about speaking to strangers about books I like or menus at restaurants.  It felt like a big jump to go into a room of strangers and talk about what I want to have happen after death while eating cake.

We (you and I) talk a lot about creating and sustaining life when we talk about family building.  But what do you think of this set-up?  Would you feel comfortable participating in a discussion about another stage of life?

Two posts about infertility that I saved to read on the weekend, hence why I didn’t slip them into the Friday Roundup.

The first was on Slate and asks why we don’t have better workplace policies around fertility treatments when infertility is “as common as breast cancer and more common than Type 2 diabetes.”  Why we have tons of debate about “whether employers have the right to limit women’s access to contraception through their health plans,” yet little debate about whether employers should cover treatments in the same health plan.

Moreover, as the article points out:

Since these treatments fall, in terms of official workplace policy, at the intersection between medical treatment, disability, and pregnancy, companies are often caught flat-footed, with many lacking precedent and clear policies—leaving managers and HR staffers to make their own judgments.

In other words, there is more of a chance that employers will get this wrong, but there’s little incentive to get it right because the burden falls on the employee.  Career + pregnancy/parenthood is already a thorny issue; and this is the worst of all worlds: announcing a possible pregnancy before there is any pregnancy to announce.  The article is a good look about all the issues surrounding infertility and the workplace.

The second was on Geekmom, and it’s why they decided to publicly speak about their miscarriage on social media.  It wasn’t only to gather support or let other people know that they’re not alone.  There’s a benefit to posting your difficult news on Facebook: “We could take our time to put our message together once and not have to rehash it out over and over again when we just didn’t have the energy to be that emotionally vulnerable in front of everyone yet.”  It changed her relationships with people she already knew, drawing her closer to the ones who could support her through the aftermath.

The first article points out all the reasons you should play your infertility cards close to your chest.  The second article points out all the reasons why you should place those cards on the table.

I was talking with Josh, trying to determine my alone line: the boundary that separates you from a desired activity if you have to do it alone.  In other words, things you do for pleasure since most people don’t really have an alone line when it comes to work events.

Some people have a really big green “go” zone before they get to their line, and only a little sliver of the red “no” zone on the other side.  Other people have a tiny green zone and enormous red zone.  Evenly split, all green, all red — the line is always personal.  And I think people often over- or underestimate where their line exists.

For me: all restaurants are in the green zone.  I like eating alone.  So every eating establishment, even date-y restaurants, are a go.  Going to the movies or theater is also in the green zone.  Any show, any theater, I’m good with going to both alone.  But not concerts.  Concerts are mostly in the red zone.  I would need to be desperate to see the act, and I am never desperate to see any act.  So concerts are over the line.  I’d go to a concert with someone, but I’d never go alone.  Same with sporting events.

Coffee houses are green.  Bars are red.  It’s not that I wouldn’t go to a bar by myself, but it’s over in the red zone, so I’m more likely to give up on the idea of going if I have to go alone.  Maybe if I was on a work trip… but even then… I’d rather spend time in the hotel room by myself than go sit in a bar.

Travel not for work.  I mean, clearly, sometimes I have to travel alone for work, but would I take a vacation by myself?  To the local beaches, yes.  To beaches farther than a three-hour drive… probably not?  To cities I know, yes.  To cities I don’t know… probably not?  Once upon a time, I went to foreign countries and traveled around by myself.  Now, I don’t think I would do that anymore.

That’s where I petered out in coming up with activities to place on one side or the other side of the alone line.  What else am I forgetting?  And where is your alone line?

I am on the final book in the Crazy Rich Asians trilogy.  Reading the first page was like getting into my pyjamas at the end of the day.  (Who am I kidding?  I’m always in my pyjamas.  If I have a day with zero video calls, you can bet that I am in a hoodie and clashing sweatpants.  But pretend that I spend my whole day dressed up and finally get to undo my bra at 8 pm.)

It’s just delicious, mindless fun.  I missed all the characters.

Anyway, I was moved to start it because there was an article about Singapore in the LA Times, which made me think about how I never finished the trilogy… I guess that thought-route wasn’t that interesting.

But the article is about the idea of kiasu, or the fear of losing out.  My only issue with the article is that the writer references FOMO, which immediately made me confused because none of the examples given had anything to do with FOMO.  The only thing similar (that I could see) between kiasu and FOMO is the word “fear.”  But while FOMO is a sense of not being included, kiasu is about not doing enough and therefore missing out.  Sort of like this.  But more the sense that you should have spoken up, and now it’s too late, or you should have grabbed something, and now it’s gone.  It’s a fear that you’ll have regrets because you didn’t do something you should have done in the moment.  It’s being able to say you did everything in your power to make something happen, leaving nothing to chance.

And the book, of course, is about kiasu, though the word has yet to come up in the text.  The grandmother is dying; the mother wants Nick to return to Singapore to say goodbye on the off-chance that seeing him puts him back into her will.  So kiasu about possibly losing out on an inheritance.  For her son, there is a sense of kiasu that if he doesn’t return to connect with his grandmother, she’ll die with them estranged and he loves her deeply.  The article made me remember that I needed to complete the series, but then article gave me deeper insights about what’s motivating all the characters.

I connect deeply with this idea of kiasu.  I am someone who worries a lot about having regrets and therefore probably goes overboard trying to control a situation so I don’t have regrets.  I guess I’m curious to see how the end of the book unfolds, and how everyone deals with their fears.  Maybe I’ll learn a little lesson about life in this totally wonderful (and only pretend vapid) series.