How was your day?

Ask me how I am right now and I’ll tell you I don’t want to talk about it. I’m a supercharged ball of anger and frustration. I’m the one honking impatiently at the pizza delivery girl who parked in the middle of the one-way street because I just want to get to my house half a block away. I’m the one emotionally eating buttered bread and drinking red wine alone behind my closed bedroom door. I’m the one who has turned off my cellphone because I need some peace and fucking quiet.

It’s been a long fuckin day. Everything took 3x as long as it needed to and I’m exhausted. I’m wearing my Kelly green Eagles sweatshirt over my crisp white Wentz shirt because I’m proud of the team for winning Superbowl LII, but I don’t want to talk about the parade. I don’t want to talk about it, including I don’t want you to ask me if I was there. I don’t want to explain. I don’t want to explain that I spent nearly 24 hours stressing and having nightmares over whether I should go or not, that I eventually went out of FOMO rather than any actual desire to be there. I ignored my gut and did something because I felt I “should” even though I knew I didn’t want to. I don’t want to chronicle the process of driving around for 2.5 hours before even getting my feet into the city and then eventually having to muscle my way out of the crowd as I freaked out. That among 4 million people, I couldn’t reach a single person I knew. I don’t want to explain that the firecrackers made me hit the deck and sent my already frazzled sympathetic nervous system on high alert, but that I couldn’t find an empty corner to huddle up and cry in. I don’t want to explain why I have unexplained PTSD around explosions and large crowds. I don’t want to justify why I turned around and yelled at the man who whispered “sexy” to me as I walked past him in Fairmount among droves of other women with their male counterparts. I don’t want to explain why I perceived the celebrations were overshadowed by the ridiculous debauchery and destruction, why I turned red with rage every time someone tossed their empty Bud Light can into someone’s bushes and then yelled a rally cheer for the city they love so much yet so mindlessly litter and destroy. I don’t want to explain my exhaustion after it taking 45 minutes to get into an Uber out of the city.

I’m wondering why it’s okay that a bunch of white college students in Philadelphia can trash the city, but everyone is critical when a social justice group gathers at City Hall.

I’m angry. Today was confusing and frustrating and challenging.  It was way too long and I’m tired.

You can have your highlight reel and I’m really happy for you. Your memories are the ones I want to look back on a year from now and say “Ah yes, February 8, 2018 was Eagles Parade Day. Such a wild celebration.” It brings me joy to see your smiling face, or you waving a banner with your decked out daughter on Broad Street. I’m excited to watch your video of Jason Kelce in his mummer’s outfit giving that epic and raspy “Philly fuckin Philly” speech on the Art Museum steps that you could see because you’d been camped out there since 9:00am. I’m impressed with your commitment to your team and your city and the conditions you faced to prove it.

But now I’m tired. I’m excited for today to be over, for Friday to come. I’m excited for the normalcy of it. I’m too tired and angry and emotional to write a Love Note and I’m wondering what would happen if I posted this writing on my blog. I’m wondering if you’d unfollow me. If you’d consider my rawness as complaining. Maybe it is complaining though, who cares? Do you care? Have you never done this? Do I NEED to be happy, to be an example of constant joy and positivity? That’s not me. Today I’m the one that did something out of FOMO, out of a nagging “should” after ignoring my gut instinct even after it brought me to feeling physically ill. I’m the one who ignored her own advice and silenced her intuition.

I’m wondering what your experience was like.

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