Slip Sliding Away--Please Don't Feed the Mice

I thought I was doing well. Most of the time my life is very satisfying, and most of the time I'm aware of that and feeling lucky in that fact and that awareness. Then, yesterday my lawyer's assistant called. She had some questions about details, and said that my lawyer will send me an email soon about the next steps.

I know I have been pretending. Since our last meeting when I turned in my second round of paperwork, the divorce has been living in comfortable vagueness somewhere over my head. I sort of knew it was up there, hiding in a cloud that would someday explode in a torrential downpour, but whenever I checked, the sky was clear, or the clouds were only of the fluffy variety. "Not today," I could say, and go along with my business. After all, the ball was in her court. Even J urged me not to call her, when he was asking me for a progress report a few weeks ago. "She'll just charge you more if you call her," he said "Just wait until she calls you." So I was off the hook for a while longer. But she has lobbed the ball back to my court. It's a high, slow lob, and now we are playing doubles. I'm just not sure about the teams. Sometimes it seems like it's me and my lawyer against J and his. Sometimes it's seems like it's J and me against the lawyers.

Anyway, with that call I've regressed. Not just back to sadness and insomnia. Also my house has collapsed into disorganization, and I'm having trouble concentrating. I got dinner together by 8:30. I decided on the simplest thing--pouring canned tomato sauce over stuffed shells and stuffing them in the microwave--and it still took me an hour and a half to do it. I'm not even sure what I did with my time when I wasn't opening the jar, pouring, ripping open the plastic bag, putting it in the recycling, pulling the bag out again to check the cooking time, and pushing buttons. I didn't even make a vegetable. Not a salad. Not frozen peas.

My 14 year old, E, didn't mind eating late, or eating only one thing. He was just chatting with girls on facebook. Afterwards I didn't clean up. Barely put the food away. This is a bad idea. It's best not to feed the mice. They come in with cold weather, and the cat just caught one yesterday, so I know they're seeking warmth. I watched myself piling the dishes in the sink. Warned myself that I was feeding the mice. Scolded myself as I opened a can of cat food and sat on the floor so I could pet the cat while she ate. Then I just went looking for comfort: hot shower, trashy book, bed. It was only about 9:15.

This morning the kitchen is still a mess. I find that I left the cat food out on the counter. The mice have had a feast. I have work to do--including a meeting that is going to be so useless that it inspires hatred at the person who thinks it is nothing for me to drive to town for a fifteen minute useless meeting once a week--normally I work from home on Thursdays, saving a quarter tank of gas and an hour's drive. But back to the messy kitchen. E informed me this morning that the girl he was chatting with last night wants to come over today. I could tell him no, he can't have her come, but she is coming to take away his old Nintendo and possibly a kitten, so I want her to come. Plus I want to meet her. It almost kind of feels good to know I will blow off work and try to clean the kitchen before my stupid meeting.

I try to trace my way back out of this fog. It does feel like a fog. I can't find my focus or my direction. I once drove home in the thickest fog I've ever seen before or since. Most of the time I couldn't tell where I was. I was driving about 15 miles an hour through the country. It took me an hour to get from my friend's house. I was driving by feel, and keeping my eyes on the only thing I could see--the edge of the road. That afternoon on another road a woman was killed in that fog when a stupid truck driver tried to pass someone who was trying to make it home alive. His truck hit this woman's car head on. I was lucky to make it home that day. Now, I try to trace my way out of my emotional fog. My body is not obeying my mind. I spent 45 minutes this morning telling myself to get out of bed. The alarm went of every five minutes nine times before I obeyed myself. I can't even write a paragraph that isn't a mess. See? Focus! Anyway, the point is: I can trace that fog back past the phone call, but then I'd have to trace back to the problems in the marriage, and then to the problems from my childhood. It feels so overwhelming. At this point. Doing the dishes and creating order in the kitchen feels like a good plan, even if I have to work late into the night to make up for it. Maybe cleaning the dishes will help the fog lift.