Injury Week

I have not fixed my ceiling yet because this week because I had to tend to my child, who was injured at school. The injury – I gasped when I saw it — sent us directly to the emergency room to make sure he wasn’t concussed.

Lucky to have a children’s hospital nearby and like most parents I’ve spent a lot of time there over the years. The ER was jammed and because it was so busy we were sent to wait in the mental health wing. Lucky again that we only waited an hour to be seen by the doctor who had a wry, dark sense of humour, my favourite type of personality to encounter in times of distress.

Fortunately, there’s no concussion and no broken face bits. Just two black eyes and a swollen lump in the centre of his forehead. It’s disturbing to look at.

I was scheduled to work that day – I have a remote night job on a digital desk – but managed to get someone to cover for me until I could get home from the ER.

When I’m stuck at home in Florence Nightingale mode, which feels like a very large chunk of my parenting time from September to June, I do a lot of reading, scrolling, and watching things to avoid feeling the walls closing in on me.

Some things I read and enjoyed:

The trad wife essay, Land Ho

I don’t follow any trad wives – I would yell at Instagram too much if I did —  but I enjoyed the insights and the writing.

Still reading: Jacqueline Rose’s On Violence and Violence Against Women. Just finished the chapter on Oscar Pistorious and Reeva Steenkamp. Rose offers one of the most interesting interpretations of the case, the evidence, and the defence that I’ve read. It is humanizing and ethical. Will stick with me for a long time.

Finally finished streaming my guilty pleasure: British TV crime-drama Ripper Street, starring Matthew Macfadyen as the moralizing and rigid obsessive English detective Edmund Reid. It’s set in the Whitechapel of Jack the Ripper. It sounds hokey and ridiculous — and those are constituent elements of the drama to be sure — but it’s also entertaining and lively.

Which reminds me to recommend The Five, a solid book by historian Hallie Rubenhold which centres on the historical record as it pertains the victims. You feel their humanity so deeply.  Revelatory. Fascinating. Feminist.

Rubenhold also wrote a history of 18^th century brothels in London, called Covent Garden Ladies, which inspired my other TV guilty pleasure, Harlots, which they cancelled after two seasons, the bastards!

But back to Ripper Street. Wow. The ending! I won’t spoil it, but I admired it. It was different and dark and oddly fitting. It was a meaningful, unhappy ending and I liked that.

Promised a friend I would finally watch Barbie as it’s streaming now. I need to fulfill this promise this week. I don’t know why I don’t have the same energy to see Barbie that galvanized a huge population of humanity this summer but my complete lack of enthusiasm for seeing it has been a genuine obstacle to me seeing it.

But I will see it, I promise!

Speaking of movies, one I do want to see: Killers of the Flower Moon. To prepare for its release in October, I downloaded David Grann’s non-fiction book which is the film’s source material. The story is terrible and tragic and so contemporary in every way. It’s so good. Curious to see how the story is adapted.

And finally, a big thanks to the comfort foods that carried me, Christ-like, across the desert sands of this week. Thank you, Strawberry Pocky, Kettle Chips Salt and Vinegar, and an XL Dairy Milk (yes, it was Fruit and Nut but that was all they had at the store).  

Onward to next week. I splurged on a new dust mop at the grocery store today so things are already looking lively.