please tell them I'm not taking calls just now

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shadows of the eclipse on the sidewalk ~ August, 2017

"I'm sorry, the number you have reached is no longer in service...exactly.
I mean, it is, but not with any real reliability. You are more than welcome to leave a message, but chances are good she won't respond within the next few days (or weeks), unless you've known her for a very long time. If you are family, however, she'll get right back to you. But if she's never met you, and you work for any company or agency with a long name, she might hit '9' to save your message, but she will promptly forget about you until your message is ready to be deleted by her phone company. If this is the case, she will listen once more to your message, and if it's early enough in the day, she might try you back.
But again, I can't promise you anything."

Here's the thing, I don't always know right away if it's an important message or not. It seems something happened to my cognition that makes prioritization a bit muddled. I spoke once with a cognitive psychologist about this, and although he found it interesting, he wasn't available for follow-up counseling. He only saw me to determine whether or not I was applicable to receive disability due to my diminished condition. When I began crying, explaining what it was like to no longer instinctively know what was more important, this or that, and how much this loss of understanding scared me (what with being the mom of two teenagers), he realized that there was no way he could, in good conscience, send me back out into the work world.

He ended up marking the box that said I was 'Depressed'. This made perfect sense, he figured. I was only 48 years old and half of my body was suddenly left numb from my first round of MS. What's not to be depressed about? But I'm pretty sure he was interested in what I was saying, and if he had had more time, I'm guessing he would've liked to ask me more questions as to what I meant exactly, as it sounded both mysterious and even a little romantic. Okay, that might be stretching it a bit. Regardless, that wasn't what he was here for. He was hired by the social security department only to see if I was healthy enough to resume work or f*cked up enough to throw in the towel. It was kind of a lose/lose situation.

Did I get off topic again? Sorry. That happens. Let me see if I can't reel it back in a bit...give me a sec and I'm sure I can tie this back together. Okay, right. The phone. Messages. Responding.

I keep a little notepad with me. And a pen. I'm old enough that it has never felt intuitive for me to leave typed notes on my phone. I'm great at marking things on my phone's calendar, like appointments and get togethers, picking up Henry from his dad's, and going out of town. But for everything else, I try using my pen and notepad. I listened to my voicemail today. I had seven messages. One was new. Most of the others had been carried over several times. One was from Henry's bus driver. I wrote down what he asked me to do (sign a slip and give it to him on Monday). I'm glad I listened again, because I almost gave the slip to Henry's dad, which makes no sense at all and would've confused both him and the bus driver. Another call was from my health insurance company saying that I might be applicable for other services. I don't know. I can't imagine my insurance reaching out like this, as they are so underpaid and understaffed. It sounds suspicious. I hit 're-save', deciding I should probably listen to it one more time tomorrow. Right now I can't remember what the others were, but I believe they were outdated and no longer relevant. At least, I hope so, as I'm almost positive I deleted them.





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