My family isn’t really the Hallmark type. We’ll get cards out of obligation, if we find really funny ones, but suffice it to say, I don’t spend much time in the greeting card aisle when I hit the drug store.

Loki, on the other hand, seems to like to communicate via card. It’s interesting, to be sure, but also mildly irritating because he’s not exactly taking physical form to pay for them himself. And since I don’t know what to do with cards, I don’t really like to spend my limited funds on such. And yet…

I stopped at the store after work yesterday to grab ice cream since I was already feeling ill and figured I’d be able to indulge in some cookie dough nonsense without the pain getting worse. That’s the upside to whatever’s going on with my organs– if I eat something, the inflammation and pain kicks in pretty much immediately, but it doesn’t get worse if I eat something else within a few hours. I seem to reach max agony right away, so I don’t have to worry about making myself crazy sick. Ergo: ice cream. While I was there, I realized that since my mom’s birthday is Sunday, I might as well look for funny cards for her and for Steve. Sure, okay, assuming I could figure out where the cards were in this particular store. Finally found them tucked away in the back corner, and the very first aisle I went down had “birthday cards for her.” Cool. I spotted a fox peering up from a “birthday – mother” slot and felt the twerp poking me towards it. As you’ve already noticed in the pic above, it was neither a birthday card nor a mom card. It was a card intended for me. And I very nearly burst into tears in the back of a crappy little CVS while my ice cream melted in the basket at my feet.

“For fox sake, hope things get better soon.” Me, too, Loki. Me, too.

Things are in the process of getting better, in their way. My gas was finally restored after a month and a half of no hot water, so that’s a pretty big deal. My psychiatrist is squeezing me in before office hours on Monday so we can discuss changing my meds; I’ve been on the max dose of Lexapro for several years, and it seems it’s lost efficacy. As evidenced by the last month or so, I’ve been in a much worse place mentally than I have been in years. It’s been much, much harder to get through the day lately, and I shouldn’t be struggling with depression this much. All I do at home is sleep, and all I do when I’m at work is think about how much I want to go home to sleep some more. I’ve been really struggling to engage with my friends and the myriad hobbies I have, and when I’m awake, my thoughts are just in very dark places. Hopefully a change in meds will rebalance my brain chemicals so that I can do the work I need to in order to be more present and alive.

But for now, I can look at the card from Loki, and know that my gods are thinking of me. And if and when this passes, I can tuck it away with the other cards he’s pestered me into buying, because whenever I do venture into the greeting card aisle, the first one I pick up is always at his urging, and he gets huffy and naggy if I put it back and walk away. For someone who has no use for cards, I’m sure cultivating quite the collection. The Norse gods: they’re just as weird and as whiny as me. Hallmark and their ilk seem to serve as effective modern day oracles, I’ll admit that much. I might not be big on greeting cards, but damn if I don’t get timely messages from Loki through them. But until he gets a job to pay for them himself, I’m going to have to start leaving him in the car when I run into stores. That shit’s expensive.