I’m not sure of my verb tense there.

Is it still his birthday if he is no longer here to celebrate it?

Should I have said ‘today is my Dad’s birthday’?

Damned if I know.

But one thing I’m sure of is that I’m really feeling the truth of the adage that grief is love with nowhere to go.

I woke up at 5am with a migraine in progress.

This was a silent migraine not a head pain one so my main symptoms were nausea and vomiting. (Not a fun way to spend your time, by the way.)

And I had the other symptom that plagues me during this type of migraine – intense stress and anxiety about something I can’t change plus a big dose of self-recrimination.

I have always that that stress was one of those things that brings on that type of migraine. Maybe it is but I have had a lot of stress in this past year and I have had few, if any, of this since March of 2023.

Last night, as I was lying on the dark with my mind racing, not sure whether throwing up would make me feel better or worse, I realized that I couldn’t move my thoughts away from that stress. I literally couldn’t make myself think about anything else.

(Usually, when I get stressed in a non-migraine situation, I can make a conscious choice to explore some other idea and breathe my way through the worst of things. Not last night though.)

And that made me realize that this problem often happens when I have those type of migraines.

So now I am wondering if those type of thoughts are a symptom of my silent migraines instead of the cause of them?

Interesting to consider but I hope that I don’t have much opportunity to figure it out one way or another.

I had a lot of trouble writing this morning but despite my brain’s continued objections I persevered and got my writing done.

Gold star for my efforts:

Today went a little sideways and I spent the majority of the day organizing some of my art supplies for a project.

I’m not sure if I did the organizing because the day had gone sideways and I wanted to salvage it a bit or if the act of organizing supplies was why it went sideways.

Was this a day spent focused on a task or an unfocused day spent avoiding other tasks?

Damned if I know.

When I was younger, I fell victim to the pressure to go out and have fun on New Year’s Eve.

I hated it.

I loved the idea of dressing up and going to a really fun party but it always seemed like the pressure to Have A Good Time made people edgy and there would be fuss and tension.

And/or it would mostly be a perfectly ordinary party with a tinge of disappointment because it wasn’t special enough.

So instead of enjoying an evening out, I always just felt kind of let down.

Eventually, I caught on and started having smaller get-togethers with just a few friends and good snacks. Just a regular get-together but with an extended timeline.

And these past few years, it has just been a quiet evening at home with my husband and sometimes with my sons.

Tonight, we’re all home and I expect I’ll be asleep before 12.

Sounds like the perfect way to end the year and start the new one.

Just say no to mandatory fun.