Unicorn in Atlanta

Rage, Rage, and More Rage...

I'm late.

You know that viral post of where your younger self meets her older self and the younger self is ten minutes late, but the older self is ten minutes early?

Yup , that's totally not me. Both my older self and my current self would be ten minutes late. I'm a chronically late person. I’m admitting it here.

With high-stakes events, I'm much better like an author visit, a photography session, a flight, Eid namaz at the masjid. But for other things (doctor appointments, meet ups, extra-freaking-curriculars), I struggle.

Electronically, I rarely miss deadlines for edits or what not, but in real life, tell me a time and I really will try, but fail more often that not.

I was emailing and emailing important emails mind you when I noticed to get to my daughter’s appointment at 2:15, the recommended time in red font, I needed to leave. Right now. But my mind argued “I already checked in online, the real appointment is 2:30 and they'll probably make me wait in the lobby for a while.”

So I left later than I should.

I didn't get to eat lunch or feed baby properly because the appointment fell right at the end of nap time. I grabbed an oversized apple, a spotty banana, a couple of crinkly cliff bars, an almost empty bag of dried up snacking dal.

Howell Mill road is known to others who deal with the traffic as Hell Mill and my car moved inches as precious minutes ticked by swiftly.

Then the freeway at the exit became a parking lot. I called the doctor's office “I'm almost there but all the cars are stuck on the highway.”

The lady's voice was honey. My ears welcomed her words. “There's a twenty minute grace period.”

I exhaled and tried to take deep breaths as I finally finally finally made it into the mammoth sized parking deck. Once there, I ran inside to begin the check in process with Chirpy Nurse in Barney Purple, age 20 something. I lamented to her how I was stuck in traffic, you know how Atlanta is, and do you have a long commute?

Chirpy Nurse in Barney Purple answers “Ohhh I live two minutes away and take the back roads. I rarely encounter traffic.”

I respond with how lucky she is, surely she encounters traffic at other times?

Chirpy Nurse in Barney Purple shakes her head, Nope. Not really.

I detest traffic. Inside my head my eyes are rolling and it's just not fair but I respond in Chirp too. “You're like a unicorn in Atlanta!”

The more I think about Chirpy Nurse in Barney Purple, the more unfair it seems. My drive home should be twenty minutes but it's Atlanta. It's not yet 5 pm rush hour. It still takes 45 minutes.

I'm the type of person who can be calm but tiny things add up and annnnoy me. When I drop the children to school and there is a person running, running! In the morning at 7:52 am, frolicking in the sunlight, I am angry. I complain to my children, “I can't believe that person is just running at this time!” Its just not fair. While I'm schlepping children on chaotic school runs, aforementioned person is soaking up the literal sun. My children ask me why I hate the runners so much, and I shake my head, it’s just not fair.

Above image is from my book UNSETTLED and is exactly how my anger works.

(Imagine me as the kettle steaming silently until it screams)

End rant. There is no neat solution or twist to this post, just lamentations.

Things that are giving me life right now:

*Squares of Sunlight

*The burly policeman who pulls up at home in his driveway and automatically puts up his hands in triangles to catch the children outside playing football

*Writing this venting post on my phone then laptop then immediately pressing publish without checking for edits, because I hate edits!

*Black boys who stop their football game to fist bump my toddler’s fist

*At an author's visit, Asian and White 11th grader boys who are on a wrestling team and are coloring in the library on their break time with colorful markers and have matching bleached yellow team hair.

*Mo on Netflix, trying to finish the episodes before Ramadan!

*Noha Beshir's grandmother post, I may share my older blog post on my grandparents soon!