Saturday, September 14, 2013

Been a long, tiring, emotionally draining, couple of weeks.

There's the stuff in the news, and then there's the stuff that happens because of the news.  When it appeared strikes were imminent on our neighbor Syria, our Embassy went into overdrive, our little CLO office included.  Not that you could see it, really, it was all in the back rooms.  Much like the making of sausage, you really don't want to know. It went on for 2 weeks and every day was another day of planning and prepping and doing stuff that needs to be done anyway but done triple-time and NOW.

So there was that.

Then there was September 11th.  Nothing happened, thank God, but again, with the anniversary there's a lot of prepping and ramping up of security and everything on edge.  It's draining.

And there was the passing of my cousin a week ago.  His funeral was yesterday and of course I wasn't there, like I miss every other funeral.  His obituary is a touching one and can be found here: http://bangordailynews.com/2013/09/08/obituaries/daniel-rhoda/

I'm the oldest cousin on both sides of my family.  To see folks younger than me pass stops me in my tracks.  More than Syria, more than 9/11, it puts my mortality right in front of me.  It's exhausting.

And now I'm fervently working to avoid this cold turning full-blown.  I'm tired all the time.  My head is stuffed.  My eyes are worn out.  I've added the physical exhaustion on top of the emotional exhaustion and this means that anything and everything drives me to tears.

Yeah.  I'm a mess.

I don't need pity, I need understanding.  I don't need counseling, I need cooperation.  And I don't need help, I need sleep.

It'll all come in due time.

But until then, I'll be under the covers. 

Sunday, September 1, 2013

Jerash Trip

The CLO hosted a trip to Jerash today, since the Embassy was closed for Labor Day and the kids were in school because ACS is mean.  Jerash was hot and deserted, and we went with 34 of our friends on a tour bus with a tour guide, followed by a family style middle eastern lunch. Obviously, no pictures with our people in them, sorry.