Monday, I'm in Love

I actually like Mondays. I don't like all of the "blergh Monday" attitudes that float around every seven days. I love my job, I love going to my job, and I love starting a new week. In fact, I might say that Saturday is my least favourite day of the week, followed by Friday. The anticipation of a weekend is what turns me off of Fridays while the anxiety of accomplishing something every weekend crushes Saturdays for me.

I don't work on Saturdays. That might sound like a "duh" statement, but as I am a teacher, that may sound odd to some. Sure, I have papers to grade, emails to respond to, lessons to consider, etc. But, I figure if most Christians can take Sundays off without feeling bad at all, I can take Friday night through Saturday night off like the rest of the Jewish world does.

Granted, most Jews don't do ANYTHING if they observe the Shabbat, including cooking and cleaning, but I like to think of it as my day of reflection and personal improvement. For instance, oh hell now that I think of it, this past Saturday I just went shopping and took a long nap... At any rate, I usually MEAN to do something like write a pattern for knitting or crocheting, get some crafting done, mess about with my garden, play with the dogs for a longer than usual amount of time, that sort of thing.

Why wouldn't someone like this? It's a day of rest! For me, it really isn't. As mentioned before, I get a little anxious about what I am accomplishing each weekend. Sunday I couldn't care less about because it's just... I dunno, the day before Monday to me. Back to the anxiety: There is this overwhelming feeling of needing to look back on a given day and say what I have done and be proud (for lack of a better word) of it. I have had professors that hands down would not work on Sundays due to religious beliefs. That is what I am doing with my Saturdays, in case you were wondering. I have also seen professors fall behind on their work perhaps not simply due to the fact that they take an entire day off, but I'm sure it doesn't help matters.

Then there's Monday. The coffee tastes better (Foglifter is amazing in case you were wondering, and it comes in Keurig cups!), the shower feels warmer, the animals act better... Everything just seems to fall into place for me on Mondays. By Friday night though, I need that break. I suppose that's another reason that I don't look forward to weekends: by the end of the week, I am completely out of spoons.

Oh! The spoon theory. Let me briefly explain: The idea is that you have a limited amount of "spoons" representing an action you are able to complete each day. You have a set amount of spoons depending on your condition, and once all of your spoons are gone (or, once you get to the point in the day where you cannot physically or mentally do anything else), you're SOL. You're done. You can't gain spoons back. They may replenish daily (I feel as thought mine are more of a weekly thing but I'll explain later) but again, every single action you take removes a spoon from your day.

So, yes. My spoons are more of a weekly thing. I start off with an immense amount of spoons and they kind of roll over into the next day. But by Friday, all of my spoons are gone. At 3 pm, when I am done teaching for the week, I am spent. I cannot bring myself to do anything regarding work. I suppose my spoons replenish over the weekend. I do not have a debilitating physical illness, but my depression more often than not takes the front seat by the end of the week. 

Needless to say, it's disheartening at best. I hate the feeling of weakness that enters me by the weekend.

But, I still have Monday to look forward to. That's something, at least.

I should be a life coach

No, really. Even though I can't get my own shit together, I should be a life coach. I have a way about me that convinces others that I am right about... well... everything. Witchcraft!

Tonight I talked to a friend for three solid hours about things that others around him have been trying to tell him, but for whatever reason he didn't listen to them. Something about how I confronted (read: ambushed) him and put the fact out on the table made him see things for the way they were. Sorry I can't be more specific. At any rate, I got a sincere thanks (another thing I won't say unless I mean it) from said friend and hopefully a lifelong positive result with very few refresher ambushes in the future.

But for me? Let's see here. I slept for 14 hours straight on Sunday, I think. What day was that? At any rate, I read all of Portia de Rossi's memoir, Unbearable Lightness, in one sitting (about 3 hours). It was wonderful. My review of it is on goodreads. That's another thing I need to make lucrative for myself: reviewing books and getting paid for it. But anyway, I digress.

I stayed up until 3 am reading that damn book, then slept all day, unaided, and awoke only to have dinner prepped by Andy. Over the weekend, we finished painting the kitchen and I cleaned out the blue room a bit. We found the perfect couch and figured out it wouldn't fit into any part of the house, so we sadly passed it by. I cleaned the far corner of the library (I swept and picked up all the books! And I put the books where they BELONG!) and fussed at Andy about his... different... way of looking at cleaning up. My idea of cleaning up is putting things where they belong. His idea has become shoving things under other things. I was unhappy about that.

Here, I will apologise and admit fault. For the longest time, things had to be exactly how I wanted them. He learned long ago that moving anything in the house could potentially set off an avalanche of angry words and accusations. I guess I should have let Andy know that since we moved into the house, wherever he thinks something should go is where it should go. No more do we have to worry about hiding things away or stacking shit on top of more shit like we did in the apartments. We have more than enough room in the house. For that, I am eternally grateful. So yes, thank you Andy. And I'm sorry.

He knows my stance on those phrases.

Speaking of "should," I got to dish out some advice I myself was given a year or so ago to the aforementioned and unnamed friend. A knitting buddy, Paige, was listening to me grouse about the things I should be getting done. I should have been finding another job, cleaning the apartment, doing school work, blah blah blah.

Finally, she gave me her priceless advice: "Fuck should."

Just... fuck it. There is no should or should not. Kind of Yoda-esque. But at any rate, should is a state of mind, not a necessity. When you think about it, should is in the eye of the beholder, but much more often in the eye of the beholder's overlord.

Above mentioned friend kept saying he should do this and that and then gets sucked into the sneaky hate spiral, or at least the sneaky guilt spiral (we also discussed the difference between Jewish guilt and Catholic guilt-- guess what kind of guilt he was subjected to) and accomplishes nothing. He will admit that.

But what he SHOULD do is nothing. Should is gray. What he wants and needs is so much more important. Yeah, he NEEDS to get some of his shit together. He WANTS to get his shit together. Thus, he WILL get his shit together. The should feeds the apathy and the guilt. Should is a bad word in my philosophical worldview.

I SHOULD go to sleep. I took two sleeping pills 2 hours ago. I WILL finish this blzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz