I failed. (big surprise) I redoubled my efforts towards goodwill and composed action, because I could tell that I was battling a hateful undertow left over from yesterday. So I helped the boys make father’s day presents for their father and his father. We made colored paper picture frames and I dug up old photos. We made a mixed cd for Opa – Ears wanted country, so I let him have Whiskey Girl and 10 Rounds of Cuervo. I was aiming for generosity of spirit, all the way around.

I was still a bit iffy, so I walked the park a couple of times too besides running at the gym. I got my nails done and a pedicure, hoping for a reason to look pretty soon. I went and bought vitamins, green tea extract. What is restorative to my body usually works on my head too.

Then I went to get shorts for the kids and a slip for myself bc those vintage ebay dresses tend to let your ass show through. I was doing my thing, mulling textiles.

Then I got run over.

Ya know people who will swerve to hit a cat or a bird on purpose? Well a guy on one of those disabled (often fat assed) scooters swerved to run me down. He clipped me first in the Achilles tendon, which got caught between the wheel and wheel guard so that I couldn’t pull loose easily, and when I did and fell backwards, he gunned it and ran over my other foot. He smiled and drove on. He was with a couple of teenage boys, his sons presumably, the younger of which rolled his eyes like “not again” while the older one helped me up, said “Sorry” and shrugged and then ran to catch up with the asshole on wheels. I was still kind of holding it together, but I was limping and moving too slowly not to have to watch a white trash mother scream at her two-year-old and yank her along by the arm while the kid said “ow mama”and sucked her thumb . . .

I got to the van just in time to sob. To hate disabled people and wish them all dead. To hate people and to wish them all dead. To go under the tide of sad and bitter and missing my own father, resenting the stupid god damn hallmark bullshit holiday to put me in that mood, rooted here instead. To, in short, feel utterly sorry for myself and then pissed about that too, at myself and at everyone else. [update: x-dad-in-law sent me the sweetest email about TJ . . . X is full of shit, playing people off each other like a little kid trying to get the best deal . . . insert 'fatigued maternalesque sigh' here]

It really is hard to stand tall when you’re small.