Some nights feel like all I’m trying to do is decompress from the stress of the day. My mind is going in 12 different directions: I’m thinking about the lesson I screwed up because I hadn’t anticipated something, or I’m thinking about how I could have handled a situation better here and there, and I’m thinking about all the grading I have piled up… I am just feeling like I can’t let go as quickly as I wish I could.

It helps to go find other things to occupy my mind, so I end up reading about things like Kanye and Jay-Z or Weight Watchers hacks or “27 Ways Cats are Actually Fluid” or “In Michael’s Wake” hurricane pictures. I can’t do the really deep stories that get into the losses, deaths, or other things. I’ve skimmed some of the stories about the Washington Post reporter who was killed in the Saudi Consulate in Turkey, but it’s too enraging to spend too much time on it. Same thing with national politics: it just pisses me off, so I’m trying to avoid a lot of it.

I try not to have quiet brain time because then I find myself perseverating over things that happened at school or things I feel like I could have done better or what have you. It’s the classic anxiety spiral of shame and disappointment, so I try to avoid thinking by reading less consequential news stories and funny pictures.

Now I’m going to listen to a Wow in the World episode with Annika and try to fall asleep. It’s going to take some more decompression, but I’m getting there.