Oh, the good old days when I compartmentalized everything, shielding myself from emotional pain, disassociating from the political beat-downs I was hired as a proxy to suffer, and feeling free to fill my time with all kind of distractions for professional advancement. Those days are long gone … and good riddance.

Now, I’m old and retired. I began suffering chest pains a few weeks back. And, as many of you already know, I am Mom to a troubled kid. She’s 21. She lives with us. She works in a grocery store that attracts cranky customers; the kind that like to find a small person behind the counter, one who looks weak and meek, one who probably won’t fight back if they chose them as that day’s punching bag. That’s what it seems like. These angry and disillusioned customers come through the automated doors targeting small-in-stature clerks that they can verbally beat down at will with impunity because they’re pissed off about their life and the world, and they can’t help but spew their frustration and ugliness at the first vulnerable grocery clerk they find.

My daughter is that small person, who is not only tiny, but also, because of her serious mental health challenges, struggles to groom herself. You know, she forgets things … like taking a shower, brushing her teeth, washing her face, wearing clean black jeans to work, and making small attempts to comb her hair.