Last day of ‘vacation’. Well feels like half over already last day of ‘vacation’. This is always the day I dread when I take more than one day off. The day I spend flogging myself mentally for all the things I didn’t do or get done in that time frame.

Didn’t even finish one book? Bought 6 more instead? Great, you’re only up to 15 physical books in your backlog and oh don’t even look at your kindle with all the $1.99 books you’ve bought over the past six months. Don’t even touch Comixology and all the graphic novels you’ve bought or borrowed on there. Not to mention the 10+ issues of your series you’ve fallen behind on.

Knitting projects? HA! Started a gift for Jordan you’ll probably finish when her kid starts college. Good job, ace.

A good chunk of this time I’ve contemplated reaching out last time and for once actually be straight forward with the fact that it’s my last time. Didn’t do it. Can’t bring myself to be the one to end anything. That could be my Indian name. Reality though is that I’m tired. Mentally, emotionally, physically. I think about things M has said to me over the years, how much appreciation there is in that friendship and in that there are moments I have the gall to believe that I deserve better than this. Nostalgia only goes so far. I’m fine with friends that I don’t talk to every day or see very often. A great deal of my most prized connections are with those I’m lucky to see physically only once or twice a year if that. Some not at all. Physical space has never been a requirement to be my friend.

I can’t help but feel in my gut that actions taken outside my scope of knowledge are enough to break the chain. And yet. And yet.

I know I can’t always be the buoy or life jacket, hell I can’t even do that for myself…but I keep trying. All I picture when I think about some of my most toxic connections is faces on a shore watching me drown, waving and smiling.

When will that be enough for me to cut the line and safe myself?