crankiness is a ...

Ok, so I am a bit crankier than usual these days. I can feel it in my lack of finesse, my curt answers, my failed smiles. I'm tired and cranky and just generally disappointed in my fellow human being.

Strike that.

I'm disappointed in the majority of human beings. There are still a few that have not disappointed me. My child, for one. There is nothing at all disappointing about her, ever. And sadly, she bears the brunt of my crankiness. Pre-adolescence and wild mood-swings accompany her these days, but I know it isn't her fault. She comes home and melts down in a wailing ball of misery, then, she reflects and apologizes, and brings one of her childhood favorite books, Mama Do You Love Me? and asks me to read it to her before bed, she snuggles in, sucking her thumb, and cuddles in the crook of my arm as I read out loud to her. Today she read in full on British accent scenes from Harry Potter which she is tackling with exceptional speed after finishing Libba Bray's trilolgy of teen girl angst and drama while we were off at Water Polo Nationals.

I am trying, desperately trying, to make this final thrust of the dissertation happen. I have a good feeling about this year's job market, and in any case, it is the final moment for my Santa Barbara limbo. After this year SOMETHING will be decided, even if that something is an unexpected twist. And I feel... well... cranky.

Here's the problem. (And sadly, I thought I had overcome this aspect of my social self, but alas, I have not.) I don't like "groups". I like individuals. But as soon as there starts to be a group dynamic in which people are "included" or "excluded" or there have to be constant events in which every member of the group is convoked... well I just flee. I can feel it happening. I start to singe at the edges, and then the inner heat boils and I implode, caving in on myself. I cut bait and abandon ship.

I am better off alone, I tell myself. I do better when there are nobody else's heavy expectations on my shoulders. I am better off where no one else can hurt me.

So I call Jeff and apologize for not being more welcoming now that he is going to live on this coast. I make plans. He belongs to no group, not to me, but to my pantheon of past. But there are always places where ghosts can seep in through the cracks.

I guess it is true. I. and I are a team, terribly difficult to break into for anyone. Don't expect that our little hermetic seal will ever be broken, either. So for now I just try to tie up my loose ends and seal myself back up, crawling into my snail shell, pumping the air out and sliming my way shut with a wet sucking whoosh.

Yick. I am highly unfond of myself right now, perhaps it shows.