Saving up Dopamine

A Bitmori cartoon of me, a fair-skinned,
green-eyed, ponytailed brunette-with-grey
person wearing a blue tee with a progress-
flag heart and exhibiting heart-shaped fireworks.

Look, anyone who has been reading my blog - any of my several blogs - knows a few things about us. I'm a widowed mom of two, one of them 20 and the other 15. The 15 (Lizzy) is AuDHD (that's autistic and ADHD for people who don't sling that particular lingo), I probably am as well, and the 20 (Abby) is almost certainly dyslexic and possibly ADHD (theater is a socially acceptable way of channeling that). 

You know that I'm fat, that I hurt my knee a few months ago and I'm in physical therapy for it, and that I loathe the hypocrisy of so-called patriots. You know that Lizzy is not a great student, although she's hyperlexic and an avid learner if she can do it her own way. You know that Abby is a bit shy unless she's bursting into song and dance or telling you about anime characters.

In general, we are an anxious bunch, really.

And - as with Thanksgiving - we try not to be hypocritical assholes around other national holidays.

This isn't easy, you know. I'm not feeling super patriotic in our oligarchy-that-is-headed-toward theocracy; it's not safe to be anything but a cishet white dude. I disapprove of fireworks that are illegal, super noisy boomy ones, and/or are let off by amateurs outside of the hours approved by law (and by extension, a sheriff's office that won't enforce those hours any more than it enforced mask mandates). I kind of despise the sort of folks who think it's their God-given right to BSU just for funsies, and f*ck the pets, veterans, or others who just want to feel safe in their own homes. 

Unkindness pisses me off.

You'll have to excuse my tone; my fitness apps are unhappy with the amount of sleep (very little) that I've gotten in the past two nights. And I suspect tonight as well.

But here's the thing: I don't really want to celebrate the big ol' US of A right now because a lot of folks I love are not safe here, but I do want to celebrate summer and hanging out with friendly neighbors and healthy kiddos. And as in that Thanksgiving link above, I think it's important to celebrate the small things, even if I really hate most of the big things right now.

And I like the pretty lights, if not the booms and whistles.

So here's what we did. We went to the safe-n-sane fireworks shop and got small things - ground bloom flowers, sparklers, a couple little fountains, and a bigger fountain or two. Nothing that sends flaming balls into the trees, nothing that makes us flinch away from the sound, and nothing that shakes the ground. We'll be setting those off (sparklers just before dark), with our neighbors across the street, as we have done for years. It's the sort of thing we even did at the height of the pandemic because it was outside. I'll keep a mask on me because the smoke is usually too much for the asthma.

But we are an anxious bunch, so I've also been running the sprinkler on my lawn for three days and nights straight, and the first step when we actually go out to light things is to fill up the kiddie pool with water. And...

And we have spent the day doing comfort activities - playing video games, reading, making cookies, even folding laundry, having spaghetti for dinner, etc - so as to be as calm as possible this evening because we feel safe.

So we're saving up dopamine by doing the familiar and comfortable. It helps us enjoy the peopleing and flashing lights, and even helps us tolerate the house-shaking thuds of the illegal stuff. 

And enjoying a celebration - even if I'm celebrating something a little off on a tangent - is important.