If Sloths Did Yoga, I Would Be the Cutest Slovenly Sloth

I’m the worst blogger ever.

At least, I would be if I was passing judgment on my ability to blog with frequency and gusto, which I’m not, of course.

As a reintroduction to my neglected life-documentation habits, I will bookend the last month or so with two illustrated examples of general slovenliness. In the middle of these two episodes, I have been putting my life together, becoming at peace with the universe, loving Lent (The Catholic church actually pressures you into becoming a better person once a year- it’s lovely), and practicing yoga, but it’s not as fun(ny) to detail all of that as it is to recount my moments of ridiculous slovenliness to you. Right?

Roughly a month ago, I woke up with pie in my hair. Pie. IN MY HAIR. How did this happen, you ask? I might possibly have been eating not-quite-set-correctly chocolate pie made for work right out of the pie tin before bed. I also might not have had any clean dishes, as I hate doing the dishes and always procrastinate about them, and might have been using a fork to eat drippy pie.  And that’s how I went to work (I didn’t have time to shower!) with pie in my hair.

This is how you do your hair when you have pie in it.


A full month after this event, it’s still very much winter here: wet, cold, and snowy. An interesting side effect of being really cold (aside from bedtime pie gluttony) is that your nose might develop the propensity to shamelessly run without your consent, or even knowledge. When your nose is numb, and your face is numb, it might take some time to realize that there is snot dripping out of your nose for no reason at all. Of course, I might also be crying. Either way, sometimes, often, in the winter, my nose is drippy.

Yesterday I was having a too-sad-and-defeated-to-move phase at my desk (these are fairly rare these days, but if any place will incur them, work will), and drinking tea out of a giant mug. Can I just say that I love these giant face-mugs? I think most people use them for soup and such, but my sister painted me one for Christmas (I would link her, but she’s lame and not on facebook or the internetz, so no such luck) and I use it at home for tea all of the time! It’s like a giant tea pot. For your face, and your insides.



Dramatic reenactment


Yesterday I was clearly too sad to move my body enough to lift the tea, so I was delving my face towards the cup on my desk in a half-hearted attempt to chai my way out of my sadness and despair. I overshot and pretty much dunked half of my face into the tea. As I resurfaced, I sighed at my general failure to thrive, and thought, “I hope there isn’t snot in my tea.” Shame. SHAME.

And so goes my life, basically. Lena Dunham has nothing on me (aside from being famous and wildly successful).

Thankfully, my entire office is not as sloppy and haphazard as I am. I stand in stark juxtaposition to my other Americorps compadre, who had worked here a full year before I came.  We dress similarly, are both going to grad school for social work (she macro, me clinical), we’re both vegetarians (well, she’s technically a pescatarian, but let’s not nitpick self-labels here) and seem like we should have just loads in common. She is always more beloved than myself, however, and I think I’ve stopped fighting it.

I recently read this really shaming article about why some people are habitually late, and it made me feel sad about myself and I want to have friends so I’m trying to be better about my perpetual late-ness. If you’re worried the office doesn’t function as it should because of my propensity for less than timely behavior, good news for you! NM is always early to everything, and the first in the office every morning. Her hair is smooth and shiny and bobbed, braided sleek against her head, while mine is frizzy and waivy and generally a long, hot, kind-of-managed mess. When we recently managed a registration table at an awards ceremony (she was lovingly assigned to do so, I stepped up to the plate second-string because I’m rarely asked to do anything and I was bored), she smoothly, clearly, and loudly directed people to our table while I positioned my scarf in such a way it hid the stains on my white shirt, pretended my cardigan didn’t have a hole in the elbow, and smilingly directed people to the coffee and pastries.  When we do presentations at high schools, giggling boys will pass up notes addressed to her.

She has keys to all of the office things, I don’t. When I offer to help with something, she smilingly replies that she has it taken care of. I often feel like the less-favored child, pluggling along in my poverty and slovenliness while she takes center stage and is handed awards. If I shovel snow for three hours on a weekend, she shovels for seven. Even though I’m sure some of my annoyance is highlighted in this post (WORKING on it), I don’t wish to be NM in any way. I am as pretty (high school boys’ opinions don’t count), as smart, as capable as NM, even if I am rarely given the opportunity to demonstrate this.

Rather, I’ve recognized in NM glimpses of myself. How did I have any friends in college?! Taking an excess of tasks because it was easiest to do them myself than to manage and work with others, constantly trying to prove myself to someone or something, looking perfect, sometimes at the expense of another. Well, that’s a shame. Threes of the world, be shamed. BE SHAMED.

A friend was recently talking to me about enneagrams, and I’m either a two with a very strong three wing or a three with a very strong two wing. I’m leaning towards the latter, but there are all kinds of rules about how you can only have a "wing" next to your type and this and that and I don’t fully understand all of the rules and regulations. Threes are The Achiever. Threes spend their time performing, pleasing, accomplishing, achieving, doing. Although none of this should have been self-revelatory news, it’s always interesting, I think, to delve into what motivates oneself. I’m motivated by accomplishment, and I don’t havvveeee to be. Everything is not THAT important, and sometimes it means I have come off as snooty or self-involved or exclusive, which is not nice and universal and such.

One of the greatest changes I’m implementing in my life is giving a lot less fucks. While I’m sure this would be horrible advice for some individuals, for me, it’s life changing. I’m so much more zen and Mudita and stable and happy. And possibly humble, but my blog is probably a bad place to try to convince you of that.

 Any of my advice should probably be taken with a grain of salt anyway, since the other night when it was a full moon and I had half-bathed my face in tea I started crying when I learned that “buffalo wings” are actually little baby chicken wings.



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