The First Summer of the Rest of My Life

In the great ebb and flow of life, I am definitely at high tide. At least if the quantity of water in that condition can be translated into Stuff That Needs To Be Done.

I am navigating the unfamiliar waters of being the primary care-giver for a sick spouse, untangling the multi-layered complexities of wills and trusts and estates and long-term care options that won't leave us penniless, especially since my employability continues to hover just north of zero.

And speaking of employment, there is the painful realization that I am the parent who should quit working because they can't afford the child care. This because through no fault of her own, my spouse requires a care-giver while I am at work. And the more I work, the more expensive it becomes.

In the most odious irony of my life, I am paying to work.

Even better, I'm too young for social security.

Just for the fun of it, I am also attempting to move from a modest condominium purchased under severe time constraints and which is an unmitigated disaster. Then there is the challenge of attempting this without it becoming an out of control, cash-sucking train wreck.

Like the Popeil commercials of yore, I must breathlessly inform you: Wait! There's more!

I have a stalker. A male co-worker who is obsessed with me. Who repeatedly hacks my computer. And who repeatedly appears just as I arrive at the garage after completing my route.

Creepy? You have no idea.

As only a sibling could, a sister inquires of me: “Who'd be interested in stalking you?”

Exactly.

To continue in the vein of vintage advertisements, I will paraphrase a nineteen-seventies TV commercial: Only my stalker knows for sure.

So yeah. Life is sucking pretty hard at the moment. And in between the medical appointments in far-flung municipalities and the estate-planning and the house-hunting and repairing the stove and the dishwasher and the plumbing and dealing with a stalker, something has to give.

And that would be the raft of sparkling and informative posts you're accustomed to seeing at The Square Peg.

• A friend with an interest in astrology reminds me that my birthsign is the goat. And while we're rarely the first one across the finish line, we cross it with unerring regularity.

I will deal.

Baaaah.