Grateful

Making light of the dark

Grateful.

Sitting here in a home with no electricity. Just one day after finally receiving running water in my kitchen. Our faucet was broken for 5 days. No ability to wash dishes. Which meant no ability to prepare meals. Alongside that, the water pressure in my shower was suddenly too low to take a proper shower or wash my hair. If they had taken one day longer, we'd be sitting here with no power AND barely any running water.

Mercury girl, what are you doing!? I need the astrology girlies to assess the skies, stat!

It also just happened to be week 5 or 6 since I touched my hair after promising myself that I'd tend to it this past weekend.

Of course I was frustrated but I stayed resilient. Took hoe baths to stay fresh. (Shoutout to having a bidet!!). Bought take out when needing to eat immediately. Washed my hair with the little water pressure we had and used a cup to do the rinsing. (Brought back memories of my mom washing my hair when I was younger and using a cup to gently rinse my sides). My partners friend lives in the same apartment complex and allowed him to wash most of our dishes at his house so our home wouldn't smell like shit and start attracting bugs. He also gave us a free gallon and case of water, since we're cheap and were previously using a faucet filter. Big shoutout to community!!

It sucked not being able to meal prep like I wanted. It sucked having to eat take out in the midst of us both really trying to fix out diets. It sucked for my boyfriend to lug wet and dirty dishes back and forth from building to building late at night. It sucked not being able to take a shower with the detachable shower head like I so deeply enjoy. And it really sucks now not having power.

But I couldn't help but be grateful. What if I didn't have the excess money to buy take out night after night? What if we didn't have a friend in the same apartment complex to give us drinking water and space to clean our dishes? What if we didn't have money to buy paper plates and cups? What if we had children to feed? What if we weren't okay to go withour power right now?What if we couldn't find the silver lining?

I think about that alot. What if I didn't know how to be atleast a little optimistic? Who would I be if I didn't know how to find gratitude?

Right now in this moment, watching time pass in slow motion, I decided to try writing to speed it up. I recently wrote about manipulating time here.

Shoutout to the multiple charged power banks keeping our phone batteries alive for the night!! It honestly feels good finding the small glimmers of joy when and where I can. Of course I'm frustrated, but I actually like when my bedroom is fully lit with tea light candles. I love the crisp quietness when all of the electricity is out. And the cicadas have shut up.

And of course I was starving but I get a small thrill out of finding ways to squeeze nutritional needs with minimal food. Like the nutrionist version of Chopped lol. So I improvised with a protein shake (literally just protein powder and water) and crackers with almond butter for dinner just to avoid opening the fridge. And guess what, I'm full. Wild. And I didn't have to blow another $60 on doordash, although I could've.

Again, grateful!

What else can you do in the dark but make light of the situation?

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I feel dramatic writing this, but the alternative is to stare at the dancing flames of my bedroom candles for another hour, or binge another Kindle book on my iPad, which is what I have planned after this. Thanks for reading. Take a moment to be grateful tonight.

Disclaimer: I fully understand the privilege I hold, which is why I titled this “Grateful”. Despite the frustration and number of inconveniences, I understand how good I still have it in general. And that's the biggest thing keeping me sane. This was written as my way of sharing how I made light of the really really inconvenient situation these past few days, and going.