I feel not quite right. My world has been upended, a hard thing for someone used to and fond of minimal change. Things are starting to level, for myself and the child now in my care, but we had a rough week.

Head-bumping. Conflict. Annoyance.

I accept the lion’s share of the blame. I cannot allow myself to forget, even for a moment, that this is a child coming from trauma. Trauma informs much of what we do.

And can you imagine how scary it must be, to be taken from what you know and dropped into the strange? I don’t like it as an adult, and I have more resources and control than a child.

This has also sparked memories around my step-daughters, so I’m having to deal with things on multiple fronts. Tough for someone who’s a fan of a certain river in Egypt.

Thank God for counsellors.

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The weather is currently irritating me. I’m not a fan of ambivalent weather. Get cold or don’t, snow or don’t, but this constant threat with nothing to show for it is boring.

I tried taunting the weather, but that didn’t work. And since we’re not likely to get an impressive late-season blizzard (or even an impressive early-season one – my locale doesn’t do blizzards), bring on spring.

Late spring, if possible. I’m a fan of being warm.

Bring on summer.

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It’s a strange thing to visit someone with a terminal disease. It’s the forever elephant in the room and there’s no intervention that will fix it. I’m refusing to do the regular family thing and not talk about it, but that brings another issue – the obsessive desire to talk about it all the time. I don’t think that’s my mother’s plan and at the end of the day, it’s the person with the problem that gets to drive the bus.

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When I was in treatment, I was accused of being judgmental. It’s true, I can be. Harsh as well, since the two often go together. I’ve softened some these last few years when it comes to my relationships with other people, but sometimes, compromising one’s principles is not only not possible, it’s ill-advised.

How did so many selfish and nasty people get involved in politics? We’re shifting more and more to the right, feeding hate to the masses the world over. Look at us, not learning from history. Again.

I’m starting to suspect we’re not smart.

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Conservative philosophies they tend to be insular. They create factions, an “us-and-them” mentality that those at the top exploit in ways that dangerously mirror the behaviour in cults. They’re not indoctrinating to do good, most of the time. It’s for money and power, mostly.

Also, I don’t know who needs to hear this, but the gospel of prosperity doesn’t have much to do with God.

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Politics and economics are my degrees and my enthusiasms. Political Twitter is my happy place (don’t look for me there, I don’t want you to see me that way) though I often feel like a lone canary. I’ve been getting some traction of late, however, which is a nice hit to the dopamine centres. It’s hard to stay on the high road, however. General anonymity makes the cheap shot tempting.

I’m grateful for the growing popularity because the leader of the national conservative party of Canada (the CPC), Pierre Poilievre, is a nasty piece of work and I like it when my opinion is heard.

He’s transactional, a quality in politicians I loathe. He’s also a sinecure, which means he lacks skills, a fact he demonstrates on the daily. He’s also too willing to get into bed with hate to score a “win.” He’s taken MAGA to heart and is trying to make that ugly his own.

I may be equivocal in my personal relationship, and I may try to walk softly and gently in most areas, but I’m not that way about politics at all.

By the way, make sure you vote. It’s your responsibility as a citizen and the absolute minimum for your country that you can do. There are still too many people in this world who don’t have the chance. Don’t waste what people fought and died for.

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I tried the JLo sheet masks this week. They hook onto your ears to stay in position, handy, since it’s hefty. It comes in two pieces which saves me from cutting it myself. They’re my new favourite sheet mask.

I also have a new favourite BB cream – the Purlisse one that just arrived. I do like subscription services like Ipsy and FabFitFun. I just wish they were free.

I think everything I want should be free, in fact. Partly because I don’t have a great deal of money, but also because I hate spending it. I want to have my cake and eat it too.

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I spent a fair bit of time in my closet this week. I organize when I’m stressed or in distress, so my closet and drawers are now looking lit. Ditto the makeup, skincare, hair tools, and shoes. I used the rainbow to organize within each clothing section – short sleeves, long sleeves, pants, skirts, vests, jackets, and dresses – though I still skew to the dark side of the spectrum. Also, some colours aren’t on the rainbow. What’s up with that? Where do I put my greys? How about pinks? Black?

There’s a new rainbow in town: white, beige, pink, red, orange, yellow, green, various blues from light to dark, greys, brown, black. I’m still not sure about the beige location – I would like it to be next to brown, but that puts light in a sea of dark, which is just weird.

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To quote Ferris Bueller – “life moves pretty fast.” So, take a moment. Take a breath. Read. Laugh. Go outside. Wear a sheet mask. Not to cure mental illness. Not to fix anything, in fact, but because being nice to ourselves is a good in and of itself that we fail to do too often.

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