Category: Life

  • Second Vax, Aftermath

    I was anxious the night before I went to go get my second vaccine. I can’t put my finger on why that is. I was anxious for the first one as well, but I chalked that up to anticipation of having waited sooooo long to get this process started. This time around, I knew where I was going, I hadn’t had any fever or anything from the first, and being that I never got Covid in the first place, the odds of me getting an adverse reaction were low. But there I was, up at 5am, thinking about the shot.

    The story that keeps, sadly, showing up in the news is that many people are not getting their second vaccine. The reason for this can be for a mirid of reasons; forgot about the appointment, couldn’t get off work, or got complacent. I think I saw on the news last night that 5 million people haven’t shown up for that second shot.

    My first and second shot were at North Central Bronx Hospital, and I am happy to report that the second shot waiting area was packed. Sadly, it was people my age and older, and I think out of the 40 people I saw, only two were, or at least looked, under 30. That’s not great, but I did take as a point of pride that NYC is taking getting their shots seriously.

    That was yesterday, and as of this morning, all I have is a sore arm. My wife, on the other hand, has a low-grade fever, body aches, and a headache. She did have Covid, way back at the start of this whole mess, so her reaction is what was predicted. Not that it makes her feel any better.

    But it’s done. We are vaxed.

  • Totally Vaxed!

    I got my second does today! I’m all vaxed up!

    Now, if you haven’t yet, go get your shot!

  • A Home in the Country

    We are going to get out of the City for a long weekend, and I think it is long overdue. I could be wrong on this, but I don’t believe we have slept outside of our apartment since June 2020. A good friend of ours has a little house upstate. It’s in a small subdivision of a neighborhood, and has all the feelings and trappings of suburban bliss, from about 1970. The family friend is out of town, and has offered the house to us. We jumped on the opportunity.

    When we stay at this house, or when we Airbnb/VRBO a house that is in a neighborhood, I play this game in my mind of wondering what my life would be like in the suburbs? I have lived in New York City now for fifteen years, and I am thoroughly City-ized. And by that, I mean, I can live in a very tiny space, and have people on top of me all the time. Having lots of space is now very foreign. Could I function with so much room?

    It reminds me of a story. We have some friends who used to live in NYC. They owned a small one-bedroom apartment, and when their kid was born, they knew they had to move. Very fortunate for them, their tiny apartment sold very well, which allowed them to move out to the country and buy a house. When we went to visit them after their move, their modest house was sparsely filled with furniture, and pictures on the wall. “We have more house than stuff,” they told us, “but we don’t want to buy stuff just to fill it up.” Their house is still scantly decorated.

    I think we would also have a home with nothing in it, a little Scandinavian Style. (You know I have an IKEA fascination, right?) I’m not excited about owning a house, but the older I get, I find myself wanting a yard. Well, a back yard actually. Not so much for me, but for the kid. A backyard and an imagination is a pretty awesome thing to have as a kid.

  • Trouble Sleeping, Some Anxiety

    I have been having trouble sleeping of late. The other night was pretty bad. It took a while for me to get tired, and then when I did go to bed, I couldn’t stay asleep. It felt like I was waking up every thirty minutes or so. The thought that kept replaying in my head was that I wouldn’t be able to get a job when everything gets better, because I will need to get a job. We can get by on one income, but we can’t get ahead unless I bring in some money.

    I keep thinking that I am not going to get a job because I’m too old. And I kept thinking that I am not going to get a job, because I don’t have any useful skills. And I kept feeling worse and worse about myself. It created a downward spiral of negative thought, that I just couldn’t shake.

    And then I went to a very dark place. It wasn’t so much a specific memory, but more of recalling a deep emotional feeling. I started to relive the emotions of the time period when my mother was dying, and the complete lack of sympathy I received from my co-workers. (To make this quick, the place that I worked wanted me to quit to save money, so two co-workers took it upon themselves to bully and harass me so that I would leave. And yes, I did go to HR and they said there was nothing they could do.) It was difficult to deal with the emotions of losing my mother, while also having to survive eight hours of isolation and intimidation. It was a one-two punch that was miserable, and depressingly lonely. I am very fortunate that I have my wife, family, and friends, as without them, I don’t think I would have survived that period.

    I like to think of myself as a mentally well-adjusted and fit person. That was an awful period of time, but I did come out on the other side with a better relationship with my wife, and father, and family, and friends. And all of that was due to talking about it, and sharing, and making ourselves vulnerable which allowed healing. It’s still a work in progress, as there are bad days, like the other night. But… I know it will get better.

  • Ants

    It’s spring, and it seems like the world is slowly coming back to life. Flowers are blooming, trees are budding, and grass is greening. And bugs are back. In our tiny apartment, that means the ants are back.

    We get ants in the Spring. And I hate ants. These are stupid, little black ants, which are called Little Black Ant, annoy the shit out of me, especially their stupid, unoriginal name. They are easy to kill, and stop, but man, it’s like two weeks of those little bastards just showing up along the edge of the wall. The kid hates them, and also thinks the ants are out to get her. So, we have to have a calming down moment before she goes to bed to make sure she understands the ants aren’t after her.

    Stupid ants.

    Growing up in Texas, the fear was fire ants, as those assholes are awful. For every kid, there was always a moment when they accidently stood on, or fell on, or kicked a fire ant mound, and those evil guys swarmed, biting the hell out of you.

    I remember my dad buying fire ant killer at the local hardware store in the Spring to deal with them. The stuff he bought was a poison in the form of little yellow pellets that he would spread around the mound. The ants would think its food and bring it into the nest. Slowly, over the course of a week or two, the mound would die off, and a little pile dirt was left in the yard, like the ancient ruins of a civilization. I would dig up the dead mounds carefully, to see the tunnels that they had created. It was fascinating that little things could build such complexity.