Each week, Friday tantalizes me with whispers of resolution and release. Each Friday begins with the only meeting I routinely look forward to and enjoy, followed by days that are generally quieter, calmer, and more settled than the other four days of the work week. Projects get finished. Email inboxes fill more slowly. Students rarely panic at me. It’s as if everyone and everything is hanging in suspension, just waiting for Saturday.
This particular Friday was going to be even more special. All week I’d looked forward to it, planned for it, done a little bit each night so that I’d be ready for it, switched schedules with a co-worker so that I’d be ready for it. This particular Friday I was going to be driving home to see my family and celebrate my mom’s birthday.
This particular Friday my mom got sick and told me not to come.
This particular Friday, Pippin barfed all over everything, multiple times.
This particular Friday I have one of those annoying headaches that’s not quite bad enough to warrant drugging the living daylights out of it, but not quite NOT bad enough that I can forget about it.
This particular Friday my cold coffee, most people’s updates to FriendFeed, strange duplications of feeds from my feed reader, my cold hands, vendor emails, and a whole host of other things that don’t normally bother me are picking insistently at the frayed edges of my psyche.
This particular Friday is not living up to its promise.
Still, it’s not all bad. It’s warm outside, reaching up toward the thaw point. I’m also wearing my new shockingly pink silk long underwear, and it always startles and amuses me whenever I catch a glimpse of it. So maybe I’ll just continue quietly hiding most of FriendFeed, buy some hot chocolate to replace my cold coffee, go find my shawl, and delete anything that’s not actually important from my inbox. Oh, and figure out what to do this weekend that will make it seem less like The Weekend I Was Supposed To Be Elsewhere and more like a relaxing break between work weeks.