I’m Not Angry Enough

I had plans this weekend.  I was going to write at least 3 blog posts (I don’t usually write blog posts ahead of time but I’m realizing I need to start), read for 24in48 readathon and drink lots of coffee and cider.

Isla was spending the weekend with the localist grandparents, and I was going to GET SHIT DONE.

Because my time management sucks, I’ve read a grand total of 7 books this year, and I need to stop wasting time on social media and actually write real things.

Neil and I even made a pact that we wouldn’t do our usual coffee and Facebook session in the morning, because his face is alright to look at, really.

There was coffee and one book.  And then Isla came home early.  That worked for me, because I was starting to miss her.

I didn’t write any words.  No blog posts.  No Great Americanish Novel.

We made popcorn and watched kid shows.  Such is the speed of my life.

Then we started a game of Monopoly.  Isla and I are very competitive.  Neil is very Neil.

Isla gathered a little bit more than half the money and then went to bed.

I promised I’d stay up and write 2,000 words, and then read a book.

I drank Baileys and went to bed.

The next morning, we finished Monopoly and then decided to go to the movies.

 

 

Now.

The only accessible seats were not together.  I’d have to sit behind my family and try to convince myself that this was NOT a metaphor for our family dynamics.

I will sit in the back row if it means that Isla gets to see a show, I will be dragged backwards through grass if it means I see her face at the tippy-top of a swing at the playground.

I wait at home when Neil takes Isla for walks that are too outward-bound for my chair.  He takes photos and brings them home.  He doesn’t want to go without me, but I don’t want Isla to miss out.

I don’t want her to miss out, but I’d rather be beside them.  Like at the movies, in the seats that were unavailable.

We booked the individual seats. Because I said I was happy as long as Isla was, but I would rather sit together.

Isla said she didn’t want to go if we couldn’t sit together, so we didn’t.

We stayed home, but it stirred things up.

Neil says I yell too much.

Now, before Isla was born I kind of spent my working life making the world a more accessible place.

My personal life was spent hearing things were not accessible, showing up anyway, and developing a rating system for all the asses I saw before me.

Since I became a mother, I spend a lot of time telling other disabled mothers that we are no less because we can’t reach the buttons on the dryer. That we are no less because we have other people clean up our kid’s milk-soaked sheets (although it’s embarassing), that we are no less because we can’t run at Field Day.

That we are no less because we sometimes have to set in the back row.  We can see a lot from there.

This weekend, Neil suggested that I yell too much. That I shouldn’t take things so personally, or put myself down.  He suggested that I should take all the advice I give to other people.

He suggested that I’m too angry.

‘Do I yell at you?’

‘Not much,’ he says.

‘Do I yell at Isla?’

‘Not much.  I’m just suggesting that you could deal with stress better.’

‘Can I go for a run?’

‘No.  But you could do laps around the house like you used to.’

(I could.  But I’m old and fat.)

‘Can I take off in the car for an hour and come back with ice-cream?’

‘No.’

‘Can I go for coffee with my best friends who aren’t you?’

‘No.’

‘Can I go out and get drunk with the people who still understand me when I’m drunk?’

‘No.  But we’d have to go to New York for that.’

‘Can we go to New York without spending stupid money on hotels?’

‘No.’

‘Is it OK that in 2018 there are places I have to sit in the back row?’

‘No,’ he said.

‘Then I’m not too angry.’

I’m not angry enough.

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Also published on Medium.