“Then that happened…”

This is what I said to my friend after I broke down on Friday night with the truth of how lost I’d been feeling. 

She said to me, You can’t do that. You can’t say something like what you shared, and then cover it up with a joke like it wasn’t important or true. 

And that’s what I want to do with today’s blog. I want to try to stem some of whatever reactions I believe you might have had to yesterday’s blog of anger and fear and isolation. Because no matter how I feel in a moment, I do need you greatly, and I want you to still like me and not to think that I’m a whiny, privileged person who’s lost perspective on the world. 

So, I’m going to try not to do that, to reverse any effects of what I said yesterday. And simply let it lie. 

I do know that my job is not scooping animal carcasses off the highway, or cleaning toilets, or any other job that many people have. I have friends who've lost children, husbands, gone bankrupt. I mean, I work at a high-end retailer in Union Square, not on a chain gang. And I'm going through cancer survivorship stuff, like I imagine and hope those of us who have to, do. 

I know, too, that in times like these, we all seem to lose some perspective, and I allow myself to have that for now, because I do know it will change. 

But, I guess I did need (or want) to put how I've been feeling out there, even in this impersonal forum, because it is the truth, and that’s what I tell here — with or without back-peddling. 

So, whatever reactions you might have had (because I can see from the stats page that many people did read that blog), I hope … well, I hope it’s okay I put the truth there. And I'm trying to let myself be okay with it, too.

"You can't save your face and your ass at the same time."