So. As I said this morning in Congress, today is the one month anniversary of the last day I woke up with two working eyes.

I have not gone a single day since then without doing interviews/panels/being a research subject/being a witness

Y’all. Getting shot is fucking TIRING.

Anyway I’ve also, y’know, been dealing with a new and fairly major disability. And if I can be so bold, and with much love to the well-meaning: it’s a pandemic and bad shit is gonna happen to your friends, before we even get into evictions and uprisings and whatever else 2020 has

You know what’s been great? People who’ve just been like “hugs I love you, lmk if I can help.”

You know what’s sucked? People telling me how badly they feel about this thing I live with. People demanding to help so then I have to think of ways for them to help them help me.

If a friend of yours has bad shit happen please don’t poke at them when they’re clearly not up to socializing, even if you want to be sure they’re okay. (Unless of course you are their person, in which case you’re exempt)

Send messages of support with no expectation of hearing back! Ship a bottle of their favorite liquor to them with a nice note! Send cookies or flowers or in my case a bedazzled eyepatch that says “fuck you” on it!

But please don’t ask people to help you watch them grieve.

Me, I cope with *everything* with the darkest sense of humor. I grapple with the worst shit by treating it lightly until I’ve had time to let it settle.

It has not helped me when people told me how serious this was and to not make light. I am aware; I’m the one with one eye.

Some of your friends will need to cry, and joking will not help them. Everyone has their way and I promise you that when shit is at its worst, people show themselves.

If you would help your friends, follow their lead. Trust that they are handling their own shit their own way.

The best, the absolute very best you can do for someone who has just had a major thing happen is ask “what specific thing do you crave right now” because in cases like mine I’m suddenly trapped and it makes me want weird shit at odd times, like pregnancy cravings

At any given moment I might want a specific cocktail because it tastes like normal or I want this one thing from some fast food joint because I don’t eat much but it sounds good. I want someone to find me the one comfy dress cause I can’t search myself. It’s odd trapped things.

Your friends will need you. But they will need you to either send support ever so delicately, with no pressure, or they need the freedom to actually say what they want or need and you just hear them and do that and know that it helps.

Anything else is about you, not them.

I thought it was worth saying because I’ve a feeling it’s gonna be a lot of people this year having to cope with some next-level traumas and grief

And nobody ever knows what to do with that, though everyone means well and wants to help.

Anyway. I have dealt with a few weeks of a madhouse before, only this time I switched the difficulty to nightmare.

The way I’ve been making sense of it is that fuck it, it’s happened now, might as well do the work I just qualified for, and give the thing itself some time

A month is a good solid amount for me to have written this thing twenty ways and interrogated it from every angle and pieced together the timeline and causes and such.

Let your friends figure out what happened if they have to before they can rest and heal.

I guess what I’m saying is it’s a hell of a year and do whatever you need to do to grok it. Help your friends do the same.

I’m taking a few days off pain and rage, I think. Back to whiskey and dick jokes, and also I’m gonna need advice at random setting up this half blind thing

Related: if I missed your tweet/dm/WhatsApp/text/email/call:

If I know you, I definitely saw your name on the notification and appreciated you.

Professionally, no way I can wade through the backlog so if you need anything I’m starting back up work next Monday

And thanks, all.