My UCD classes start a week from today. I’ve been working like crazy and will continue to do so, but I have gotten quite a bit done.

Two of my three Winter classes are graded. My two Sac City classes are all prepped for this week, and I’m caught up on that grading.

I sent my reworked syllabi to my Spring UCD courses, though I still have to build the Canvas sites and make the videos and assignments for the first couple of weeks.

I have a meeting about moving the comp exam online tomorrow. And I’m scoring Literature in Translation exams for IB this month. At some point soon, Melissa and I have to approve the last round of proofs so our textbook is available for Fall classes.

My daily “breaks” consist of cooking–trying out new recipes. So we’re eating well. I made an enchilada pie last night and pork katsu with homemade sauce the night before. (The stores are out of sugar, so my son has forbidden baking. All of our sugar must be saved for iced tea.)

Thoth loves having me home, especially in the mornings. He gets up in my lap or on the desk and pushes me with his paw. Sometimes, he moves my hand off the mouse. Sometimes, just pushes my chest back into the seat. This subtle code means he wants me to lie down on the couch (I’m allowed to have my laptop out as long as I don’t move too much.) He’s conked out on my chest right now. He probably won’t move until Dante comes home. Thoth doesn’t like being caught adoring me; he has a rep to protect.

Dante and I are aware of our luck in still having jobs. He’s checking in on a friend who’s laid off.

We’re also aware of the risks we have. He’s working retail (Target), so he’s coming in contact with more people than is advisable. I had to go into a med center this morning for my asthma medicine. My asthma makes me at risk of Covid complications, so I’m in a bind. Going to the med center itself is a bad idea, but so is letting my asthma get bad if I go without the drug (it’s not something I can give to myself, unfortunately).

My intrusive thoughts this week are less about the apocalypse and more about the possibility of being one of the casualties of this virus.

Have I thought about how I need to pack a “going to the hospital” purse, since if I do get sick, I won’t have the energy to do so when I need to? Yes.

I am trying to hold it together, so I’m refraining from tearfully apologizing in advance to my son about not being able to leave him any financial stability, and about not being able to leave an apartment purged of letters from long-ago lovers and sex toys.

I’m refraining from calling my mother to tell her that if I do die, responsibility can be traced back to everyone who voted for Trump. I’m mostly refraining because THAT’S EXACTLY THE KIND OF DEATH BED GUILT TRIP SHIT SHE WOULD PULL, and I don’t want to become my mother in what could be my last days.

It was bumpy, not surprisingly.

All of my students nodded vigorously last week when I said they would have to read all of the instructions carefully.

But the students who were careless and unprepared before are still careless and unprepared now.

There is one advantage–in my intro to lit class, we’re hearing from people who have never spoken in class before, which is awesome.

Some students say they miss class, of course. Some have said they like the screen capture video I made because they got to hear my voice.

One student wrote to me this morning just to say he missed coming to class because it was an oasis for him, a good distraction from the rest of life.

Everyone’s favorite thing so far? A video of one of their TAs fighting a plastic spoon.

I don’t know if anyone else got pulled out of class to talk about their essays. It was the beginning of the term, ninth grade. Our history teacher gave us a warm-up free write–what were we afraid of?

I should have said sharks.

But I had written about the end of the world.

HBO’s 1981 documentary/movie, The Man Who Saw Tomorrow, about Nostradamous, is partially to blame. The image of the man who will bring about WWIII, turbaned and entering a room through a Star-Trek door, is imprinted deeply in my mind.

I’d also been reading the Bible. I was trying to understand the religion I was being raised in.

My essay included a detail from the Bible–about how God would not spare anyone, not even women heavy with child. I’m not sure why I picture her running away from earthquake fissures, but I do. My small Conservative town had many people in it who thought abortion was the worst thing you could do (our town had one of the first abortion doctor murders). God, though, was willing to take the life of that unborn child.

We were all fucked.

My history teacher told me I didn’t have to worry about fleeing God’s wrath while pregnant.

My apocalypse fears didn’t go away, of course. I just talked about them less. My long-term boyfriends knew about them; my long-term therapist did too. Mostly because of the nightmares.

One of my boyfriends, when I was ending our relationship, tried to use this fear to persuade me to stay. “You’ll need me if there’s an apocalypse. And I would protect you. I would kill you before I let someone rape you.”

Note: People can survive rape; it’s not the worst thing I can imagine. It’s up there, but not the worst thing. Something happening to my child is the worst thing.

Also: The smart thing to do would be to use their distraction to figure out how to get us out of there.

Of all of my nightmares, one is the most vivid. Something had happened. I needed to pack a backpack and go, never to return. “How many underwear?” I remember thinking. I started to pack my pills, all the drugs that keep my alive. In my dream, I stopped packing and sat down beside the backpack on my bed. It was useless to flee; I was going to be dead in a month.

I woke up.

Therapy did help. The nightmares lessened.

Not surprisingly, I’m being triggered right now. In between the panic of having to get Winter quarter graded and keep my semester classes going, now online, and rearrange the whole way I teach for Spring quarter, and fears about the economy tanking so badly that I lose my job, I’m having lots of intrusive thoughts.

“What if this is the last time I have ice cream?”

These thoughts do not lead to a mindful enjoyment of any given experience.

I don’t know how to end this post.

I don’t know how things like this end.

Los Rios, where I’m teaching two semester-length classes, has moved their courses online indefinitely. Davis is also online for the rest of the quarter.

Today will be spent figuring out how to make next week’s classes work (in addition to the other work that was already on the schedule).

The chaos has upped my workload and my “I have to be on the computer” time exponentially. I’m already feeling the strain on my spine.

Frankly, I’m worried about losing my ability to take care of myself under these circumstances. It’s too easy to get lost in tinkering with a syllabus or in grading. And there’s no forced break where I have to walk to class and teach for a few hours, standing up and walking around. (I realize how perverse it sounds to say teaching is a break.)

So if any of you want to send me a message every once in a while, telling me to take a walk around the block or to go pet a cat, it would be welcome.

I may have walked a few too many miles than I should have on Thursday, but I love walking in the Quarter, my old haunt.

Yesterday, as I set out for the Pharmacy museum on a sunny day, I didn’t see a big hole in the sidewalk, and I sprained my ankle. I hobbled on–and got to rest at the museum (which was amazing–more later).

About two blocks after leaving, I rolled the other ankle, badly. Luckily, I was within a couple of blocks from the theatre where I was going to spend the evening. Later, I took a Lyft home.

Today, I’m going to try to do the WWII Museum. I don’t want to stay in bed all day, though that seems to be exactly what my ankles want.

They are both swollen and bruised (from where they hit the sidewalk when they rolled). They are painful to touch, which means they are shoe-averse.

I have my cane with me. And I’m gonna lure myself out with the promise of more seafood.

Americans who want a single-payer option are often told horrible things about how such medical programs work around the world.

“You have to wait for procedures,” they say.

I get injections in my skull and neck to help prevent migraines. I’m supposed to get them every three months, but when I try to schedule the appointment, I can’t, because the doctor’s calendar isn’t open.

They always promise they’ll call me, but they never do. Instead, they assign me an appointment time and mail me a “reminder,” which is always the first I’m hearing about it.

Yesterday, I learned that I would have to skip the first day of UCD Spring classes if I were to keep the appointment time they chose. I called, but my doctor is booked until six weeks later. He is going to try to scold me about going almost five months between treatments.

If he wanted me to see the migraine specialist again, the wait time would be nine months.

Americans with insurance often have to wait for our care. Americans without insurance usually can’t get on a calendar at all.

I’ve already voted via mail-in ballot. This year, Warren is my choice.

Last time, I voted for Bernie in the primaries and then happily for Clinton in the national. Do I agree with Clinton on everything? No. Was she better in every single respect than Trump? Yes.

The person I wanted the whole time, though, was Warren. We line up well, politically. In addition to our shared aspirations, I like that she proposes actual plans to get them done and has a track record of doing the work to make things happen.

All over my social media, I’m seeing debates about who can beat Trump. Will moderates (of both parties) come to a Democratic Socialist, when studies and observational evidence show that most Americans seem not to know what that term means? Will sexists (in both parties) vote for–gasp–a woman?!?

(A woman won the popular vote last time . . .)

I honestly don’t know how this will all play out, mostly because we are so horribly irrational.

Despite everything that’s happened in the last three years, there are still voters who will sit out the election if their favorite person isn’t the nominee. That’s irrational. Despite everything, Trump’s supporters will never, ever defect. Some of them literally think he’s God’s new prophet. They’re irrational (and terrifying). Despite everything, all those “never Trumpers” and “good” Republicans will vote for Trump to avoid having to pay a cent in higher taxes (also known as paying the same rate I do), to avoid enabling people to live longer and healthier lives (even if it lowers their overall out of pocket costs for all of us), to avoid being a member of the party that loses the election. They’re rational, actually, if we acknowledge they’re just assholes.

I have no idea which candidate could actually beat Trump. The world slid off its axis several years ago.

In this primary, I get to vote my conscience.

I want Warren as my President, so badly.

In the general, even if she isn’t my candidate, I’ll vote Democratic. And I’ll still be voting my conscience. Because none of these candidates, not even (shudder) Bloomberg, is as dangerous as Trump.

I just finished the third book in N.K. Jemisin’s Inheritance Trilogy.

The end of the book has a glossary, which a previous reader has some thoughts about.

For the last nine years, I’ve compiled a Valentine’s Day mix for my nearest and dearest.

It’s never quite about love, but about when love goes wrong. It’s about obsession. About stalking.

Here’s this year’s mix:

1. I Will Possess Your Heart—Death Cab for Cutie
2. Cactus—Davis Bowie
3. Honey Honey—ABBA
4. Settle for Me—Crazy Ex-Girlfriend
5. Why’d You Come In Here Looking Like That?—Dolly Parton
6. The End of the World—Julie London
7. Don’t Talk to Strangers—Jonathan Coulton
8. Titus’s Lemonade Song—30 Rock
9. Hell of a Way to Go—Kasey Chambers
10. I’ve Got You Under My Drawers—Brak
11. We Get On—Kate Nash
12. Satisfied—Hamilton
13. Cry for Me—Camila Cabello
14. Baby, Won’t You Please Come Home?—Louis Prima
15. I’m Going to Get You—National Lagarde
16. Cool—The Simpsons
17. Baby, Let’s Play House—Tom Petty & The Heartbreakers
18. Overnight Observation—Olivia Newton-John
19. Nevermore—Queen
20. Pictures of Your Dick—Rachel Bloom
21. Love Me or Leave Me—Nina Simone
22. Are You Lonesome Tonight?—Elvis Presley
23. Is It a Crime?—Sade
24. It’s Me Again, Margaret—Ray Stevens

Almost all nine years of songs are on this Spotify playlist: https://open.spotify.com/playlist/4lNFkVYXu7VtWiDtLjGgxX.

(Spotify doesn’t have everything . . .)

Each year, I keep a desktop playlist of songs that might make it onto the next disc. Right now, there are 284 contenders for Stalkers 10.

Want non-spotify versions of past years’ discs? Hit me up!

Happy Valentine’s Day, everyone!