when I forget

I forgot an appointment today.

I have a planner I check religiously, but obviously I didn’t check it this morning, on this second snow day that felt a little like a dream when I saw the sun outside. I sat on the couch, doing Wordle and other NYT games that make me feel like I’m waking up my brain instead of putting it to sleep. Dylan woke up and came to the couch instead of immediately hitting video games, and we watched the new Percy Jackson episode, talked about how it’s so much better than the movie, how I need to watch the first five episodes before finishing in the upcoming weeks. I ran on the treadmill (ok, ran and walked and ran and walked) and felt generally productive after writing about under productivity yesterday.

Then my phone rang. I saw the number. I looked at the time, and I remembered, thirty minutes past the time we should have walked into their door, let alone the forty-five minutes past when we should have walked out of ours. They rescheduled without an issue, and I apologized over and over before I hung up, and I feel like a failure.

I made taco meat, because I work at the dance studio tonight and am not home to eat dinner, let alone make it. I made turkey meat for the guys and Impossible “meat” for us — two skillets, two spatulas, double the cleanup, but I used the premade taco seasoning. And did you know it has preservatives, and you can make your own that tastes better and is healthier, and I feel like a failure.

I would never let one of my friends engage in the failure dialogue for these small things — a forgotten appointment, using a convenient shortcut to make dinner — or for the bigger things, to be honest. I know my friends, and I know they’re all worrying and trying and worrying and probably overthinking, and I would want them to know those little things don’t equate to failure or subpar motherhood or any of the things I’m feeling right now.

I know this, solidly, in my head, where logic should rule. In my gut, though, I feel like a failure. Everyone forgets; I know this, but I’m still turning it over and over in my head and wishing I wouldn’t have forgotten.