I read something recently that equated Labor Day Weekend with New Year. A time when we all collectively re-start. I like that. Today was a shite re-start for me, but I’ll take it. My Dad once said that I stumble and fall often, but I always get back up. I hope that remains true for the remainder of my days. I didn’t want to go to yoga this morning – it was satisfyingly gray and rainy. Bed was wonderfully comfortable. But I dragged myself up, did the requisite getting ready and morning chores (which includes washing all the towels in the house for Towel Tuesday) and managed to get into Husby’s truck just in time to make it to class.

Which I did not do.

I messaged the instructor, I hydro-planed (not related to the message), nearly rear-ended a sedan, got to the studio, grabbed all required accessories (still damp from getting into the truck) and trudged through the rain. It was three minutes past start time, and even though I knocked and waved and tried valiantly to get someone’s attention, I was left outside.

Huge bummer. Because I certainly needed some yoga after a hellish drive.

Got home. Successfully backed the truck into the driveway (not something I either do frequently or enjoy) and got even more soaked as I shlepped my yoga gear back inside with the groceries I’d picked up and two hot drinks from Starbucks.

I was pretty sure I could use the day before me to get things done, but I am an expert at wasting time and getting side-tracked (perhaps my best skill is procrastination haha!). I forced myself onto the bike, lifted (who am I?!?) and went for a walk. And here I am, about an hour from when I want to start making dinner, having accomplished all of NONE of the things I need to get done. I can’t even get a photo to upload properly to this blog. Which is driving me batty.

When I was younger I had a very interesting interaction/communication exchange with my mother’s oldest sister. Thoughts were exchanged. I was shamed. For existing, I believe. If I can recall. I don’t remember all the details (I’m sure she still has the emails so if I truly wanted to know, I guess I could ask … but why I would do that, I certainly don’t know). Anyway. One of the things I do remember was a bit about how I hadn’t earned anything in my life and didn’t understand hard work. I’m not sure how she knew because I’d grown up across an ocean in a country she’d never lived in, but hey ho, at eighteen I didn’t think that rationally. What I heard, and remembered, was that my suffering was not nearly worth giving any time to or recognition of. My suffering was dismissed because of apparent privilege (being American I guess?). Anyway. I never forgot that, that there was a scale of hardship and my life and struggles didn’t rank on it. I bring this up because I am sensitive about ever complaining about how hard things are because in the grand scheme of life, my troubles are not nearly comparable to many, many people in this country and around the world. So being snarky about not understanding website formatting shouldn’t even be mentioned.

On the flip side, does that mean that anything and everything that is hard for me, within the parameters of my life, should be discounted as difficult? I’m not sure. I am certain that my problems are first world, white upper middle class problems — which aren’t usually life-threatening. But sometimes my problems are very real, and very difficult because within the framework of my existence, I am struggling.

MS taught me that.

But this isn’t about MS (despite essentially my entire life being about MS in one way or another). Today was a challenge for me even though that might not actually equate to being hard. And I find myself frustrated, exhausted and overwhelmed with sadness as the minutes slowly click by on this random first Tuesday of September.

I also have to remember that I’m that girl – you know the one. The one in her early forties without kids, in a happy marriage with three cars, two houses and a travel problem. The girl who spends her weekends going on coffeeshop dates in a zippy red sports car convertible and doing home renovations (because she can). It doesn’t really matter that I worked hard to get here; I learned some hard life lessons along the way as well as the painful struggle of an incurable autoimmune disease. The point, I guess, is that even though today was a tough one (for me, which -I think we’ve established- is relative) I still have a husband who loves me, food in the fridge, clothes in the closet, a roof over my head, air-conditioning, heat and health insurance that covers my catheters and my infusions and my migraine meds and my plethora of doctor appts. Sure, I lost my mother and my grandmother (the women who most specifically made me me) and my baby girl earlier this year. But I can still walk. I can buy shoes and jeans and skincare and get my hair done.

I don’t know. I think comparison IS the thief of joy. But how do we stop comparing? How does the cycle end?

A question for another day.

xox, g