Fleabag, again
Fleabag, again
How to: treat a cold as an adult who is also a big baby
It’s the part in Fleabag, you know the one, the confession scene. Before the saucy makeout scene, which by the way, I watched, all alone and, yeah, there are numerous sex scenes throughout the show but this particular scene made me incredibly flustered.
But before that:
I’ve always had such a difficult time with this scene. I’m a hothead. I’m stubborn. I’m the kind of person that if you tell me what to do, even if it’s logical, I get so mad that it makes me want to do the exact opposite of what you say. So, even if you consider telling me what to do, it’s pointless. I’m not going to listen.
But then I turned 21 and grew tired. I’m exhausted from figuring things out myself. Maybe I would be okay with someone telling me the things I need to do. Maybe I would listen. It exhausting seeing the disappointment on everyone’s faces in regard to me.
I haven’t rewatched Fleabag recently. I have been rewatching the Flanaverse where it’s about how people aren’t evil – they’re just desperate for love and always bad at it. Which is funny because I’ve felt so accidentally evil as of late. But still Fleabag came to mind. I was in class feeling overwhelmed by just about everything I need to do. I want someone to help take care of me. Do you see my thought process?
20s are weird. You feel so old and yet so young all at once. You want someone to call to help figure out everything and to help you. Not a parent, not a random friend, but a secret third party. I guess that’s why people find relationships so important.
I got my flu shot last week and immediately got sick. That honestly adds up to everything about me. Every time I try to do right, my body rejects it. It wasn’t a bad sickness; just a tough cold. And I turn into a big baby whenever I’m sick.
When I was younger, getting sick was a vacation. It was a day where you could stay home, have your mom cook you some soup, and have your friends miss you for a couple of days. It’s the one mandated time you’re allowed to take aak.
When you’re an adult, it becomes a chore. There’s no time to waste. But the child stays.
I’ve started calling my mom when I’m sick but only when I think there’s no other solution to it. I don’t consider the fact that my mom really doesn’t know anything about me at college other than the things I tell her. I think I understand why she was the way she was during my freshman year, demanding I call her every day. I hate calling her to tell her I’m sick. I want her to think I can do it on my own.
It’s a struggle either way. Sometimes I get the urge to call her just to call her. But then I find myself fighting the urge to fight with her. I feel so messed up and evil when I get like that.
My dad and I break down when we’re sick. We become a shell of a person and Mom has to pick up and take care. But when my mom gets sick, something she rarely does, she keeps on going.
I try not to think too much about mothers and daughters. How they’re a layered love and resentment in each other. How I looked up at the sky through my childhood bedroom, dreaming of the stars. I try not to think about how my mom probably wished the same, to leave her mother’s house. I try not to think about how our hands clench around different lists in the same way. Instead, I drink my cold medicine. I put Vicks on my throat and the ends of my feet, wrapping them in a warm sock, the same way she used to. I tuck myself in at night and keep going.
Last watched: Midnight Mass (Netflix)
Last read: Giovanni’s Room
Books read: 16/12