Dear Sephiroth: (a letter to a fictional character, because why not) #879
Oof... Sephiroth, I'm... worn out. I'm not completely fucked up, but still, I... I wonder... how in the world did I do this job for three days in a row, for as long as I did...? Holy shit.
Well. I woke up with enough time to heat up some leftover chicken and mac-and-cheese for breakfast before heading out to my shift at the house I serve. And... admittedly... I didn't wanna walk through those doors. Once again, I wasn't sure what'd be waiting for me after a week of me not being there to maintain certain things. I wasn't sure what the state of the pantry or the refrigerator would be. I wasn't sure who I'd be getting up and getting ready for the day.
...But... as it turns out... I wasn't tasked with getting anyone up and ready. Actually, Nd put me on breakfast duty immediately upon walking in. Checking the pantry, there was cream of wheat, and checking the freezer, there was still half a bag of frozen strawberries and bananas. So I set right to work making my usual thing: cream of wheat with puréed fruits and peanut butter mixed in!
...I didn't take pictures, though; given how insistently the people I serve were trying to get into the kitchen while I was making the food (they must have been so hungry, the poor things...), I couldn't afford the focus or attention for it. Sorry about that.
I did the dishes afterwards. Unfortunately, a number of the pots that I normally keep spotless and shiny were back to being a dull, grungy grey. The others there don't wash dishes nearly as well as I do, and... it's a little sad, actually, because I feel like it's really not that hard. Or maybe my ability to do that is just the byproduct of my upbringing, living with an adult overlord who didn't forgive mistakes. I dunno.
Either way, I got them back to being sparkly again, no sweat. And then I started using a knife with a straight edge to clean the gunk off the stove (some of it was my fault, from the cream of wheat this morning...). Js, helpfully, pointed me to where the stove cleaning kit was; I didn't know that anyone cared enough to get one! I was pretty stoked to not have to use a knife!
...Unfortunately, while I was trying to get the residual gunk off the glass-cleaning razor after I was done, my thumb slipped, and I got a pretty nasty slice from its tip, down to where the inner crease of the knuckle is, close to the middle of my thumbprint. And that made all tasks for the rest of the day incredibly painful and inconvenient. Thankfully, some gauze and some medical tape were readily available to staunch the bleeding (finger cuts always seem to bleed a disproportionate amount... sigh...). But this needed to be changed several times throughout the rest of the day, since, ya know, we kinda need our thumbs to do things.
But... aside from Jr being replaced by Hk (and later some other lady, who was not deliberately useless the way Hk was today) and slicing my thumb, today went pretty much normally. Actually... Js was really on top of her stuff today, and there were four of us working after Hk was replaced (since he didn't fucken do nothing...), so laundry, kitchen duties, and light cleaning, as well as tending to the folks we serve as needed went really, really smoothly today. We got everything done an hour ahead of schedule, and I even had a bit of time to rest outside, a little. And that was nice, because the weather was gorgeous today. So perfect that several of the folks we serve decided to hang out on the back porch just to enjoy the fresh air. It was good!
Somewhere along the way... I found out that our house manager's boss ended up taking the role of managing the house that she was originally going to send our current house manager to. I'm assuming that enough people who have family members living in this house made a big stink about him being pulled to a different house to make his boss reconsider. As I understand it, this doesn't represent a demotion for her; she's simply “filling in temporarily”, presumably until someone else can fill the role of manager for that house.
...Still... it seems kinda like poetic justice, doesn't it? She tried to fuck up our shit, and ended up being put in the position that she wanted to use someone else to fill. I don't want her or the people under her to suffer, but... I hope that some real-world time in the field will be a much-needed lesson in empathy and humility for her.
I got home, feeling relatively satisfied with the balance I struck between helping the house I serve and resting as needed. My muscles and joints are a little tired and sore, but they're not on fire the way they had been by the end of my Saturday shift, before I stopped working Thursdays and Fridays.
...But... I hadn't eaten since breakfast at around 7 this morning (yes... yes, I know; please, by all means, come on by and clock me over the head with the flimsy cardboard core of an empty paper towel roll...!), so I decided to get burgers, and J decided to get burgers with me. I then sat down to unwind a bit with Pokopia while I waited for them to arrive. I didn't play for very long, but still, “you” met some new friends, and a new Pokémon Center finished building, among other odds and ends...
I stopped when the burgers showed up:
...I wasn't too enamored by the fries this time, for whatever reason, so J ate most of them. I was still hungry, though, so I decided to try another one of the bags of uncommon potato chip flavors...
...Sephiroth... These tasted mostly like ordinary potato chips, dusted with a subtle hint of beef-flavored instant ramen powder. And... for sure, they weren't terrible. But I wasn't especially enamored by them, either. I ate a few, and then... put them away for later.
I breathed life into today's wishes for you after that:
...I'm trying to settle my nerves down for sleep, and I certainly am very tired. But I planned on going with Atr and a friend of his to the Greek Festival in my area tomorrow, and my mind is abuzz! I'm primarily interested in the food and the lemonade, but I imagine, being with Atr and his lovely friend, I'll be drawn to things that I wouldn't otherwise be drawn to. At around 4pm, I think, my elderly friend P will also be there. It will be good to introduce Atr to P; I wonder if they'll get along. Afterwards, I guess P wants to take me to a restaurant with a bunch of his friends to “catch up” a little, regarding each other's lives. For sure, I've not seen him in a pretty fair bit of time. Meanwhile, J will be out helping to fly a dog to New Hampshire from some faraway place. I'm hoping he'll return in time to participate in some of my things, but... even if he does, I imagine he'll be a bit too tired and overstimulated. And M... M doesn't like to do things that involve people, so he will stay home and play video games, which is also good.
...Tomorrow will be busy. I... wish you could be around for whatever shenanigans I get up to... but... I know that's impossible. So I'll just try to get a buncha pictures and send them along when I write to you tomorrow. Because I will.
I love you. Enough to try to involve you in whatever I'm doing, even if it's in this indirect way, and even if the distance between us is impossible and unfathomable. If all I can do is write letters to make you feel like part of a life worth living (because this life is one of many you've saved, I'm sure), then that's what I'll do, until such time that it becomes clear that doing something else would be more helpful to you than this. While I wait for that clarity, I'll keep having faith in your safety. I'll keep having faith in your eventual return home.
The winter storms that devastated Texas last month led to a major water crisis. But for weeks afterward, there weren't enough plumbers to help customers with the damage. All of this underscores the need for more of these skilled workers. But for women and workers of color, there can be even greater obstacles. Paul Solman has the story for our series "Work Shift."
