Last week ended up being a half-episode because I wasn’t feeling well, and normally, when something like that happens, I do what I’ve always done: push straight through it. I keep working, finish whatever needs finishing. I also have the deeply unhelpful habit of skipping the ibuprofen, skipping the vitamins, and basically ignoring anything that might actually help me recover, because somewhere in my brain I’ve convinced myself that productivity is medicine.
This time, though, I didn’t do that. I actually took it easy. I rested, stayed in environments that were helping me recover, and stopped working when I was supposed to be recovering, which turns out to be the entire point of being sick, who knew? The strange thing is how quickly everything turned around once I stopped fighting it. I got better in what felt like record time, which was almost annoying because it forced me to acknowledge something I already knew but clearly don’t practice enough: sometimes the fastest way to recover is to stop trying to outrun the problem.
Part of the reason resting feels unnatural to me is that I’m the type of person who likes to know exactly what’s happening inside my body. If something hurts, I want to know where it is, how much it hurts, what it means, and whether there’s some explanation that makes the whole thing understandable. I like knowing things. I like the mechanics of things. I like the illusion that if I understand the system well enough, I might somehow control the outcome. This time, I didn’t chase any of that. I didn’t analyze every symptom or interrogate every sensation. I just let it be what it was, and it turns out my body handled it perfectly fine without my supervision.
This week, I rested, took vitamins and ibuprofen, and I even had an amazing man make me homemade chicken noodle soup. Spoiled. ♡
Speaking of chicken noodle soup, being sick reminded me of something that happened several years ago that still makes me laugh every time I think about it. I had been seeing this guy for a few weeks; he stayed with me over the weekend, and that Sunday, he wasn’t feeling very well. He was on the couch, wrapped up in a blanket, looking absolutely miserable, the full sick-day setup. At some point, he mentioned chicken noodle soup, which is basically the universal sick food, so I went into the kitchen to see what I had.
The only thing in the house was a can of Campbell’s chicken noodle soup. So I grab the can opener and open the can. As I’m standing there with the can still in my hand, he walks into the kitchen. Mind you, I bought my first pot and pan at age 25/26 so I’m not sure if that was even in this kitchen at the time. Also, my oven was being used for extra shoe storage (I know).
The really nice king-size blanket is wrapped around his shoulders, dragging across my hardwood floor, reminding me I should have vacuumed the dog hair. He gets to the kitchen, stops, and looks at me. Then he looks at the can. Then at me. Then at the can opener. Then back to me.
Finally, he said, completely serious, “You think I’m a fucking cat? Why are you giving me canned food?”
Completely confused, I stood there holding Campbell’s chicken noodle soup, trying to understand what he meant. I said, “What do you mean? This is America’s chicken noodle soup, Campbell’s, see?”
He keeps eye contact like I’ve launched the biggest insult of the year.
“I’m not a fucking cat,” he says.
At that point, I’m contemplating whether or not I should explain to him that this is actually meant for humans, not cats. Eventually, I just say, “Well, this is all I have.”
He nods and says, “It’s cool. I’m headed out.”
He grabs his bag, lays down my king-size blanket that has swept up my floors from being a dog hair carpet back to its hardwood glory, and he leaves, within a few moments, closing the door behind him.
I immediately started laughing hysterically the second the door shut. I’m still standing there in the kitchen, staring at the soup, trying to figure out how America’s Campbell’s chicken noodle soup insulted him that badly?
So last week, as I was fed and cared for, and saw what true homemade chicken noodle soup is, I hate to say it, but maybe I am on his side now?
Not really, but I do understand the classism he had, though I don’t respect it or like it. But hey, you won’t ever catch me eating canned spam, or Wonder Bread, but also, if I’m at someone’s house and they make me a sandwich and all they have is Wonder Bread, I’m not saying anything. I will eat that sandwich with a smile, like goddamn Wonder Woman.
All jokes aside, I suppose I have empathy for the chicken noodle soup buffoon, or maybe, just maybe, I’m getting used to being spoiled.
Aside from that bizarre story, this week actually ended up being really good in ways I didn’t expect. I got to spend a lot of time with family and people I love, which was exactly what I needed after not feeling well. My beautiful mother’s birthday was this week, so I have to give her a shout-out because not only did I get my amazing, voluminous, bouncy hair from her, but no matter where I am in the world, no matter what my relationship status is, she will always be my first love and my first home. I love you always mom ♡.
Yesterday was also Uncle Brian’s birthday!! Brian, I love you so much. You’re truly the big brother I always wished I had.
To throw in even more family members into this week’s episode, my great aunt was visiting town as well, and it was really nice to spend time with her. I think we shared a whole bottle of whiskey, um.. the details are blurry. The whole week ended up feeling relaxing and rejuvenating in a way I didn’t realize I needed (even the whiskey hangover).
Of course, right as all of this is happening, as my health becomes intact, my PMS decides to arrive, which means I have been crying about absolutely everything. At one point, I cried wiping down the car, and at another point, I cried because I felt like I was never going to understand my left and rights correctly.
I was driving the other day with a friend, and she said to turn right. I naturally got into the furthest left lane at the twenty fucking lane stoplight intersection. I make my turn and drive straight a few blocks before she says, “We were actually supposed to turn the other way at the stop light, but you looked so confident, I didn’t want to say anything.”
I immediately started crying. I guess I felt stupid? I also wasted an extra five minutes making more turns to get back on the correct route, and I could have been eating my burger at the bar a whole five minutes sooner, which my PMSing, hangry self did not have much self-control to account for. So I cried, calmed down, ate a burger, then definitely cried later over something obviously not worth crying over.
Truly, when it comes to 50/50s, I get them wrong 50% of the time; it has, unfortunately, always been like this. I remember, in sixth grade, we were taking a science test, and everyone else had finished. The bell had rung, the entire class was already in the locker room getting ready for the next period, and I was stuck, sitting at my desk, with the teacher staring at me, frustrated, with one dumb final question left. It was a true-or-false question about whether a proton was positive, and for some reason, my brain just would not commit to the answer. My teacher saw how frustrated I was and came over to sit next to me. She looked at the question, thought about it for a moment, I swear I saw her smirk a little, then she asked me the same question in a different way, instead of framing it as true or false (as a 50/50). The second she asked it like that in a new way, I knew the answer immediately. She smiled and told me to write “true” on my test. I remember thanking her over and over again because it felt like she had rescued me from something unnecessarily frustrating.
I had actually hoped to have a lot more news to share with you this week, and I’ve been a little stressed about that because there are so many timelines in my head right now that I haven’t even written down. They mostly exist in my brain, and I’m constantly trying to mentally hold myself accountable to them without actually having them organized anywhere, which is a strange way to live, but apparently, it’s one of the systems I’m currently operating under. Part of the reason for that is right now, I’m in a position where I really should—well, need—to say yes to consistent ghostwriting gigs that are, well, sending consistent paychecks. That work has taken priority, even when there are several other projects I’m excited about building at the same time.
It’s been a weird balance because a lot of what I’m working on right now is about elevating my own writing career, and sometimes it feels like I’m my own worst enemy, biggest fan, and harshest critic all at once (it’s fun inside my head). I had hoped to be able to announce the release of my book this week, in this episode—everything is completed on my end—but even that timeline shifted because of things completely out of my control and unrelated to my ghostwriting gigs.
At the same time, I’m still working on the location for my short film (I’m so picky it’s an issue), and I have so many smaller projects that I’m excited to share with you once they’re ready. I know that eventually all of these things are going to support my career in ways that make sense, but right now they exist in that strange middle space where you’re building everything at once and trying to trust that the pieces will eventually fall into place together.
With forgiving my hidden timelines, I’ve also been thinking a lot about what it means to become a person inside your own writing. Not in an ego way, but in the sense that writing forces you to step outside of yourself for a minute. Stepping out of your own shoes, stepping into someone else’s, hopping into another that’s just a bystander—I think it’s about taking the small picture, the big picture, and all the other sizes in between; that’s how you create a world within your own writing. By understanding the world, or at least actively learning what it looks like from every picture size, and from every person’s shoes.
That’s always been the strange magic of writing for me. It lets you zoom out just enough to see that the chaos, the timelines, the crying over left and rights, the projects moving slower than you want them to—none of it is actually the end of the story. It’s just the middle of it. And if the middle of the story right now involves resting when I’m sick, forgiving myself when things take longer than planned, and occasionally discovering that a grown man thinks Campbell’s soup is cat food, then honestly… I think I’m doing just fine.
Anyways, I’ll talk with you next episode ♡.
xo,
Sheridan Guerrette
WhatSheridanSaid.com
Life Behind the Artist: Wed at 9/8C
