normalizing

I finished teaching my winter term course today. We planned to go pay rent and run some other errands this afternoon. As we were getting ready to go, I felt very strange. I realized something, too.

When terrible shit happens (for instance, your beloved cat becomes sick, and wastes away for weeks, and then you have to have him put to sleep), it's really hard to sit there and take it, but there's nothing you can do about it that makes it less terrible shit. Whatever you do, it's still terrible.

I haven't felt good this whole time. I've had delicious food, I've had interesting class discussions, I've been entertained, but have not felt good for any sustained period through it all. I don't think that's extraordinary in the circumstances, but it's remarkable at least.

And all my projects collapsed. I had been writing lyrics, trying to record guitar tracks, working up songs we want to record. That collapsed. I had a hard time getting myself to pick up a guitar.

I felt like I was sleep-walking through my class. I read everything, graded everything, but I couldn't keep connected, or keep anything straight in my head.

I had been working on the paper I'm presenting in Puebla in February, on Marshall McLuhan and media. Now I can't imagine what I was contemplating writing about. I didn't want to write anything here, either. It feels as if I have to start myself over again.

I don't know how. Maybe I'll start by making potato gnocchi.