It's Not a Good Day Here...

I've had one of those "Wish I could disappear into air and not be me for awhile" days. Ever do something thoughtlessly that makes other people arch an eyebrow, cluck their tongues and wonder where your brains were during the decision-making process? Clearly, the decision-making process for me has been hampered of late...whether by stress, too many peripheral distractions or the wrong quantity / quality of red wine, I've no idea. Perhaps all of the above.

• My daughter has been sick for a week with...um...intestinal flu. I've been traveling and leaving my poor husband with the brunt of diaper and linen changes. My daughter has been clinging to me all day, because I finally had the decency and presence of mind to stay home and work here so he could get some stuff done. Feeling guilty because I'm thinking about work stuff and trying to type with one hand on a BlackBerry or my laptop instead of nursing my 2-year old back to health with liberal doses of TLC and attention. What kind of mother does that?!
• The contractor we hired is taking forever to finish a simple job. It's been over a week and he's painstakingly slow.
• Sidenote: Slowness exasperates me. That's an understatement, actually. It makes me kind of flip out. I'm not patient...not with myself and not really with others, even though I pretend to be on the surface most of the time. (Or at least, I think I'm pretending. People who know me well probably have me all figured out by now and are totally laughing at that last statement.)
• I forwarded what I initially passed off as a humorous e-mail to co-workers today that was probably not in the best of taste. A friend discretely commented as much to me in a follow-up e-mail. To say I'm mortified and embarrassed and kind of hating myself right now is also an understatement. Mainly, that's because this lapse in judgement follows a similar lapse in judgement from last week while enjoying a little too much Crown and seven at the casino bar. I was a little relaxed, affecting my standard tightly-laced personal controls on speech, conduct and other areas of personal impact. Don't go jumping to conclusions. I didn't flirt with anyone nor did I gamble away money. I just didn't represent myself in the best of fashions. Fortunately, the company I was keeping was mainly composed of generous, understanding and non-judgmental people who will love me anyway and laugh at the whole incident in good humor. If only I could be as forgiving to myself.
• Here's the thing I hate about letting people know I'm a Christian -- they expect you to be perfect. They expect that if you worship God as your Creator and honor Him as the founder and author of your life, if you go to church on Sunday and if you serve in ministry, you are automatically exempt from obvious flaws that might mark you as "just another one of those kinds of people." If you drop an f-bomb in traffic (like I did in front of our church after nearly destroying the brand-new tire and hubcap because you have ZERO depth perception on top of questionable driving skill), or if you smoke a random cigarette or if you wear something a little too provocative...people are like, "YOU HYPOCRITE. And you call yourself a Christian! Tsk-Tsk." Maybe they aren't thinking that. But I think they're thinking that and that kind of weirds me out.
• Maybe...maybe the REAL problem is I'm completely OCD about how other people perceive me and maybe I should care less what they think and focus more on my own character development. But "should" does not equal "does." I am still sitting here being neurotic and worrying. Wishing I was perfect. Wishing I had the freedom to throw perfection to the wind on a rare whim just because I'm tired and don't feel like impressing people for a damn change.
• It's no wonder I take blood pressure, migraine and anti-depressant medication. I have serious identity issues.

Just call me Sybil? Who am I really? Is it who I should be? Is it who I want to be?
Most of the time, yes. Occasionally...uh, no. Today is not a good day. And today, I kind of wish I were someone else. Or at least, invisible. This is way too much damn information for a blog. But it is what it is. As one friend put it to me today, "You're not happy unless YOU'RE the center of DRAMA." Hmmm. Could be a point to that observation. Prozac, please...