How’s Your Day Going So Far? Okay…I Guess
When I was taking care of my ex after his stroke, every day was a bad day. Every. Single. Day. My eyelids would struggle to open every morning. I’d look around and realize I was back in the house I’d thought I’d left forever, at the beck and call of the man I thought I’d left forever. (Long story, different essay.)
Then I would wonder what fresh hell awaited me. Would he have a bowel movement that day? Would the kid next door oversleep and forget to come over so I could go to a yoga class? Did we have any doctor appointments? What expensive-ass medicine did we need? What new unexpected bills would arrive in the mail? What weird food would he ask for? Whom would he piss off? Besides me?
One of the things I hated the most was going into a store — which I did almost every day for some damn thing — and having the cashier ask me, “How’s your day going so far?” Not “How are you?” to which I could easily reply in a totally noncommital tone of voice, “Fine, and you?” but this stupid, invasive question: “How’s your day going so far?”
I wanted to scream, “Why is it any of your fucking business how my day is going so far? If it was going well, do you think I’d be in here buying diapers for a grown man? My day sucks. Yesterday sucked. And tomorrow will suck. Any more? fucking? questions?”
I just couldn’t fake it. I’d say, “Not great.” That usually shut them up or they’d get all sympathetic. I didn’t want their sympathy. I had a therapist for that. I had regular phone calls with friends for that. I did not want sympathy from the gal at the CVS. And I wasn’t looking to give her any sympathy either. But I simply could not force myself to smile like Tony the Tiger on crack and say, “It’s great!”
Look, I understand they might not have been having a great day either. Maybe they really desire the human interaction. I’ll admit that’s why I used to prefer going to the cashier rather than using the self-checkout. But a simple “how are you?” requires no thought to answer. You can answer “fine” and be done with it, or if you’re feeling chatty, you can go into more detail. Whereas, “how is your day going so far?” requires some thought. And some of us just don’t want to think about how our day is going…so far. At least I didn’t. Not then.
Now, my ex is dead, lots of people are sick, and I move through the world like a masked bandit. Now I never go to the cashier in a store if the self-checkout lane is open. And if I do have to go to a live cashier, no one wants to know how my day is going so far. They assume that if I’m walking on my own, it’s going fine. They don’t want to talk to me, and they’re happy that I don’t want to talk to them. The less time we’re breathing each other’s air the better.
We’re alive. We’re not on ventilators. We’re not in hospital beds. We’re not in the back of a van, being questioned by anonymous paramilitary types. We’re not currently being verbally abused by anti-maskers. We’re okay. We’re okay. Keep your head down and don’t ask any questions, and we’ll stay that way. How’s your day going so far? Don’t ask me. Don’t tell me.
