Reflections

A week back from ski land, and it's back to the funk. Lately the problem is literally pushing things through, getting things done, staying as excited in the middle and end as in the beginning.

In the meantime, I'll come up with ideas that I'm told are clever and brilliant. Yesterday I watched a colleague throw a conniption over the lack of customer service from the health care benefit idiots. Why not launch a website that throws all benefits in one, I said. He looked at me as if I were Einstein. That's a really good idea, he says. I was happy, thrilled, beaming, having that blissful moment when I think everything is going to be great, and then the next morning the spark was gone, even though the idea was fresh in my mind.

It's starting again at work, skidding through deadlines, sliding through doors that are fast closing, barely making it and then getting bitched out by higher-ups who wonder if I am stupid, lazy, rude, selfish, bored—all adjectives that describe my ADD self. It's holding others up, they scream, and I end up apologizing; it's become my mantra.

And I'm panicking too, always wondering, Is what I'm doing enough? Am I good enough? I don't know where I stand, who I am. I thought of what the new psych woman said to me: Make a list of everything you want because right now it's all over the board—the ideas, the writing, the job, the men, the friends, the activities. It's spinning wheels.

As for the male friend, he's pretty much taken a back burner. Maybe it's the ADD self, my anxious self that has scared him away. I don't think I've ever been on time; I'm unclear in my speech, the conversation jumping around like oil hitting a hot pan, and I've had trouble listening even to those whom I interview. It's a one-way road in the mind, and the steering is pretty hazy.

At times like this, I sit in cubicle land and pout and sulk, and wonder if the sparks and color that I'm told make a person unique, lively, fun and beautiful will ever be appreciated and seen. It makes me sad that much of the time, I'm misunderstood as if I'm speaking another language. I'm trying, but, in the adult world, there is no A for effort.

Last night, I had dinner with the older black man who I ran into at the bookstore and his teenage daughter. I didn't want to go because clearly I'm not interested, but I did, to keep my mind away from the man who I like but doesn't like me back. He looked at me in the middle of the meal and asked me why I wasn't married. Why do you ask? I responded. Because you're smart, intelligent, engaging, interesting, nice, classy, well-educated. I'm taking my time, I said. He replied it reminded him of a fellow track runner in college putzing around the track. He'd asked him, why he was going so slow. I'm taking my time, the runner joked.

Beyond the surface, there is my ADD self, the self that has trouble listening, focusing, who forgets things easily, always changing and cancelling appointments, overpromising, not delivering, overally critical of self and others, depressed, but as the father likes to point out, everyone has their hang ups; it just takes time to see them sometimes.

Well, on a happy note, the sky is blue, and spring is supposedly beyond the cold. It's all fine, I like to tell myself, if not simply to make me feel better.