Lost

"Did you already pick up Logan?" she asked - slightly confused. 


"No?" I answered, not understanding. "NO!"I jumped up. No I had not picked him up. It was 2:20. He had to be picked up from preschool by 2:30. I ran out the door - barely catching a glimpse of the surprise on my mom's face. 

-----------------------------------------

"One sec, I need to get a call." I clicked "hold + answer" on the screen not recognizing the number. 

"Hello?"

"Megan? Do the kids have practice today?" No way - what was WRONG with me?

"Oh! Yes, yes they do! I'll be there in a minute." I grabbed my purse - not even bothering to run upstairs to grab the folders of music I may or may not need with Logan following behind. I walked onto the porch, "I have practice!" I shouted to my mom - clearly upset with the malfunctioning of my brain. I didn't just catch a glimpse that time - I saw her full expression and I tried not to process it - I was shocked enough myself. "Eli is still asleep." 

"Okay," she responded. Simple. I have such a good mom.

I cranked the car and turned in the neighbors driveway to head the four blocks to the school. My eye caught Logan confusingly waving "bye" to me through the glass of the door. 

What was wrong with me? I shook my head the entire drive up to school.

------------------------------------------------

No, No - it isn't the migraines. I can't blame it on that - those are almost non-existent now. The headaches are back but those I know are stress headaches. They are nothing in comparison to what the pain was before. This is all mental - 100% mental.

I am mentally exhausted. Emotionally drained. Unable to remember routine, basic, simply, everyday, this-is-how-my-schedule-is-every-wednseday, kind of things.

I am never late - very rarely. And if I am late it is because there is a very large Starbucks cup in my hand and I don't count those times. That cup of rich, wonderful, power java that I may be holding is well worth the five minutes it cost me. I will get more done with it, I will be happier with it, I will be far more useful to whoever was waiting on me with it. I do not count those times, so - no - I am never late.

But I am not really 100% me right now.  My family has reached a fork in the road so to speak - but really it isn't a fork. It is more of a single crack in dry mud that once pressure is applied breaks into a fork, and that fork breaks into other forks, and those forks break into other forks and those each continue to break into their own tiny, little, little forks until there is just a land mass of broken ground and no where to step.

The Army doesn't give you forks in the road - there aren't any crossroads for us - my wouldn't those be easy. The Army gives you a flight scheduling board - listing dozens of different possibilities and then it says wait.  Because whatever flight you think you are going to be on has suddenly been delayed - or better yet - cancelled or - who knows - early! And maybe the flight you thought was yours can't take off until this other plane heads out of here and then the next depends on when this one leaves and so on and so on. Or perhaps, one flight comes in sooner than expected and now everything else has to be adjusted because that one key point changed. It is overwhelming to stare at those screens and search for the flight that says, "This is you. This is how you will get from A to B. Take THIS route"

And I am talking nonsense 1) because I honestly may have lost it a little bit right now, 2) because I am caffeine deprived  3) because I know very, very little,  4) because the little I know I can't say and 5) because whatever I do know will probably change 3 or 4 times anyway - this month alone.

And I will never understand how the largest organization of this nation can't make concrete decisions that seem so simple to me. It is in everything - hurry up and wait. Plan for this ... plan for that ... and then we are going to change it all anyway. If the Army gods were women ...

So right now I feel lost - standing before a hardened ground of a countless number of cracks, each depending on another as to which direction it will take. Each one breaking from something else. Each decision affecting another. Each presenting its own unknown. Each scaring the life out of me - relinquishing my ability to focus on the basics. Each taking away my energy which we all so desperately need. 

I cannot move forward until I know which little crack is ours to follow - and I can't know that right now. I don't know when I will.

And that is what makes me feel the most lost.