CC

I haven’t kept a journal or diary in at least a couple of years. My finsta serves as an occasional diary when I want to share my feelings on a small scale with the chosen few followers, so this entry will be an interesting exercise for me! Maybe i’ll get back into journaling, maybe I won’t, maybe I’ll spiral down a neurotic hole again.

Anyway…

Morning: I woke up this morning eepy, maybe a little grumpy; I’m still stewing over a bitchy email I received yesterday which immediately prompted me to log off for the day at 2:45pm on a Tuesday, locking myself in a privacy room at the office to doomscroll until my evening yoga class. I snuggle with my boyfriend and our (previously my) cat, Fiona, until we shower (sans Fiona) and start our days. I work from home each Wednesday because I have weekly therapy at 11am, an appointment I’ve managed to keep consistent through multiple jobs since long before the pandemic. I think I’m lucky that way, having employers who can accommodate my weekly appointments, or maybe it’s just that I’ve become confident in keeping boundaries in my professional life. 

10am - meeting to review a grant application to a NJ state agency. Goes well. My boss says to ignore the bitchy email that [redacted] sent because he is so insufferable all the time. Glad to hear it’s not just me, I let it roll off my back and resume feeling worthy of my job with stellar benefits. 

11am - therapy

12pm - virtual dietician appointment. My new primary care provider told me I’m prediabetic after the results of my bloodwork came in last week. I slumped for two days after this revelation, rotting in bed and saying to my boyfriend “nothing matters, death comes for us all, birth is a curse, existence is a prison, this is my fault entirely, i will die fat and alone and diabetic.” I’m feeling much more optimistic now. Appointment goes well, the dietician is very nice, very personable; it’s just intake so we’ll continue next week. Gonna read an article about the debate around the prediabetes label, too.

1pm - I tune into a National Institutes of Health webinar on application basics. It’s a little too basic, covering stuff I’ve learned on the job since starting in January. I tune out and log off early. There’s a summer picnic at work that I can’t attend, so I don’t feel too bad about logging off since everyone will be offline for the afternoon anyway.

2pmish - The three of us (my boyfriend, Fiona, and I) snuggle up on the couch and watch X-Files (S1 E24 - alien human hybrids woaahhh). I tried these Jalapeno Heat chips, and they’re just okay. Nothing really compares to salt and vinegar.

2:22 - make a wish?

2:30pm - I read a few chapters of Jackal: A Novel by Erin Adams. My friend and old roommate Zoe and I are buddy-reading this, and I like it a lot so far! A horror/mystery/thriller set in a Pennsylvania Appalachia town, young black girls go missing in the woods and turn up dead every June. More mystery than horror so far. 

4:15pm - Last hair appointment for a few months while my stylist is on maternity leave. Supervised by Biggie, of course. 

7:15pm - impromptu dinner at [redacted] with a friend before a show at Johnny Brenda’s. I take the trolley and it smells like soup and piss. I start a new book, Jordan Peele’s Out There Screaming: An Anthology of New Black Horror. I transfer to the el and it too reeks of piss, all parts of it. 

9pm - Willi Carlisle at Johnny Brenda’s. Idk I’m not all that into live music anymore, no matter the venue. The vibes seem off anymore anywhere I go. We sat at the bar and watched the show but everyone else at the bar would not shut up throughout the entire show. Why even go?

11pm - homebound. I order a Lyft, not too sure about the el at this hour. I don’t feel like standing around waiting for septa either. 

11:25pm - I sit at the edge of the bed taking shoes off, bitching about the neighbors across the street and their godforsaken fucking savesies cones to my boyfriend. I’m entering my third year as a Philly resident. I grew up in Delco then hopped apartments in Media and Ardmore before moving to Brewerytown with friends. Now in West Philly, I love the neighborhood, but I know this city isn’t mine. I’ll never be able to afford a home in West at this rate - every other home is cut up into apartments and the houses that do make it on the market are $650k minimum. There’s a new hideous apartment building on Clark Park that’s charging something like $3k for a 1 bedroom. I’m not even from here and I’ll be priced out soon. If Philly has no haters, I am dead. 

11:30pm - I do the dishes and deep clean the litterbox. My boyfriend is having his wisdom teeth extracted tomorrow so I don’t want to have to worry about these tasks.

12:30am - After I wash my face, change into another sleep shirt, and settle into bed with my kindle. After a few pages my amitriptyline kicks in and my eyelids fill with warm cement. 

CC is a West Philly nobody trying her best! She can be found playing bass in @erinfoxandthehounds, reading her kindle on the trolley, or between couch cushions with her cat, Fiona.