What Do I Say? [Me]

I'm back to work after visiting my father in the hospital. The return to routine is helping me a lot. I'm having moments of Sad, but mostly I'm just going about work as usual. Which is okay until a coworker asks me about my dad or about why I was gone last week.

My dad's gone home from the hospital. I'll call later today to find out how the adjustment is going. But yesterday he said he felt better than he had in months and was really looking forward to getting home. We even teased back and forth about whether or not he was going to tackle mowing the yard later this week. So I felt pretty good about it, until he asked me about my son, his grandson. Yeah, he thought he was talking to the step-daughter, and has us confused again. That happened several times in the hospital. So I know he's still got some real confusion going on.

I've seen four showings have happened for the house, which went up on the market like the day before I went to Memphis. I hope it sells quickly, but don't really have the energy to do much about it right now.

I have several teaching things coming up soon. We got asked to teach a BladePlay 101 class this Saturday, to fill in an empty spot on the club's teaching schedule. So we'll scramble just a little tonight to get that ready. It'll be fine. It's time to teach Kink 101 again soon. I meant to do it in late May or early June. I'm looking at late July now. But I finally messaged the venue about that to see what their schedule looks like. I also submitted to teach Kink 101 at Akai-Con again, like we did last year. And Dungeon 101 is next Wednesday.

So that means that this weekend is my 'public face' weekend. I need to be all Welcome-Wagon on Friday for the Munch, then I'm teaching on Saturday, then I'm teaching on Wednesday. I really don't feel like being friendly and welcoming and authoritative right now. I want to be depressed and petty and selfish. But once each thing starts, I'll snap into role and it'll be fine. And that's probably good for me, just not what I want right now.

So that brings me back to answering the question "How is your dad?" A lot of the kink folks know that I went out of town to see him, too. It seems a little crass to answer, "He's dying." But it's the truth. And I don't feel like softening it for their comfort. It's an uncomfortable question, and an uncomfortable answer to match. Because my Dad is dying. I'll make it through, and I'm more okay than a lot of people would be at this point. But I'm not happy. And I need to go ahead and focus on other things that I'm doing.

So if you see me, don't feel like you have to ask about my dad. An extra hug would be welcome, though.