Wednesday 13 January 2021

January 13, 2021

Exhausted.

Exhausted by everything.

No lectures today. Should've studied; just slept.

Found a tweet that captured the feeling:

 
 
Thank you, Elizabeth Teng and the two hundred and forty one thousand tweeps who feel the same. It's nice to know I'm not alone.

Things:

1. The Caroline Quentin interview in today's Graun set my Aspie/ADHD alarm bells ringing very, very loudly.

She couldn't hold plates and talk at the same time, so couldn't work as a waitress. Couldn't add up, so lost an admin job. Would jump on a train and go anywhere to be anyone somebody else wanted her to be. The painful shyness. The need for privacy. The vulnerability. She's fucked up, emotional, and excrutiatingly honest. She fell in love with her husband the first time she saw him. 

Yep to all of that.

2. The news that the parliament building of New Zealand has been attacked by a man with an axe.

This made me sad because when I lived in Wellington this was the level of security at the Beehive. You could walk either side of or under the gate so the actual barrier was just some gold lettering:

In my lifetime I've gone from shortcutting through Downing Street to get to and from St James's Park, to seeing that public right of way blocked by security checkpoints and armed police. I would hate for NZ to end up like that.

3. Johnny Marr (The Smiths) and Steve Jones (Sex Pistols) have both published autobiographies! Why wasn't I informed? Situation rectified with reservations immediately placed at my brilliant public library.

4. You can watch War Horse and other National Theatre productions online at the moment. Details on the wonderful Ian Visits blog. 

5. I found out about a person called Public Universal Friend. A 21st century character back in the days of yore. Possible inventor of the mullet. Is anything truly new? (No.)

6. Cannot WAIT to watch this Word In Your Ear podcast about The Beatles:

 

Thanks to Smash Hits and Old Grey Whistle Test I've loved the Hepworth/Ellen dyad for a very long time, so throw some Beatles into the mix and I am very much there for that.

7. Through the Looking Glass: I was captivated by the haunted faces of these gentle, hairy people.

8. An essay that puts into words everything I've been chewing over since I got my autism diagnosis: Am I Disabled? 

Joanne Limburg absolutely nails it. The doubts, the ambiguities, the struggles involved in suddenly having to change everything you thought you knew about yourself. The countless tangents you consider just to fill out a form. The tiresomeness of the 'oh! I never would have guessed' reactions. 

I had that conversation just yesterday, and came away feeling angry and upset - blaming myself, as usual, for something, although I'm not entirely sure what. 

For not being a brilliant verbalist, able to put them instantly at ease, when you notice how the tone of voice, the manner, changes ever so slightly after you've uttered the dreaded A-word? How their sudden awkwardness and corresponding forced jollity hangs in the air and that's the worst thing of all? 

For not being able to explain how utterly wrong the bulk of the literature about autism is, especially as it relates to women, because you know they're now thinking about Rain Man and automatons and pity, but it's not like that, it really, really isn't?

"I seemed to have replaced the labour involved in passing for non-disabled with the labour of dealing with other people’s discomfort when I chose not to pass."

Something like that. 

9. A horrific milestone reached today: more than 100,000 UK deaths. 

1564 deaths reported in the last 24 hours. 

Same again tomorrow, and the day after, and the day after, and the day after.

It makes my head spin. This was mostly avoidable. 

I have nowhere to put this feeling and no words to describe it.

10. Today's photo: the banality of evil.



No comments: