Murphy and Littlewood

Weekly Update - September 2, 2022

Let me start this update with an apology. I had every intention of publishing at least one - and hopefully two - essays this week. And it’s Friday. I have posted none. 

Y’all, this has been a hell of a week.

Have you ever had one of those weeks where you have a whole idea about how things are gonna go and what things will look like, only to have those expectations upturned at every juncture? Yeah. That was how things went at the beginning of this week.

The first few days of the week it felt like Murphy’s Law was in full effect.

Monday was the first day of school. It was also the first time that Justin rode the bus home from school. That morning there were a lot of moving parts as we drove across town to get Justin to 1st grade and Elizabeth to her senior year of high school. And while that was chaotic in itself, the morning brought another complication. Alex came over because she was struggling with some big decisions about her future and what that would look like for her young family.

Tuesday brought more chaos. We got a call from Justin’s school telling us that he was sick and needed to be picked up. Ironically, the call came while I was getting the acupuncture that helps me deal with chaotic shit. So Barb went and got him and brought him home. He was Covid negative, but had a lot of congestion from a head cold. So we spent the rest of the day nursing him and adjusting our schedules.

Justin stayed at home Wednesday. He was feeling better, but was still congested enough that we felt he needed one more day at home. Wednesday also brought a barrage of calls and appointments, and ended with an emotional call for Barb and I with our marriage group.

Thursday morning Justin went back to school. And it was dramatic. He had a meltdown after we dropped him off because we had not said goodbye sufficiently, and we had to park in the drop off line so that I could go and help him calm down.

Murphy was everywhere it felt like.

We’ve all had weeks like this. Weeks where things just don’t go according to plan. Where chaos is around every corner. Where whatever can go wrong seems to go wrong. And that is how I was seeing my week.