Here’s a visual summary of March 16, 2017:

I was pregnant for five minutes today. I went in for my 7,000th procedure to get a baby, and my doctor announced, “Looks like we won’t have to do this procedure today! Looks like you’re pregnant!”

Turns out, she didn’t misspeak even though she was mistaken. It only looked like I was pregnant. She’d let me believe long enough for happy tears to start welling in my eyes, before apologetically admitting that she’d mis-identified something on the ultrasound. She’d do a blood test just to be sure, but yeah, no, I wasn’t pregnant.

It was an awesome way to start my Thursday. More fun still was coming home to a dog with diarrhea (this is the “d-word” I alluded to in my Facebook post, infinitely more offensive than “damn”) and a clogged kitchen sink –both of which literally exploded all over today.  Much as I am reticent to admit that anything about my life stinks, these certainly did–both figuratively and literally.

Sometimes it feels like my heart beats like the tick of an egg timer, counting away the minutes that I had planned on being in charge of my life. It feels like I can literally see time slipping from me, like the needle of a gas gauge. I can feel myself clawing for the minutes back, the time I had planned on being deeply productive, but it’s like trying to stuff helium back into a balloon using only your bare hands.

Today I could feel the Catchphrase timer ticking faster and faster as I had to reroute my recovery day into washing blankets at the laundromat. I felt the gas gauge depleting as I refilled ovary-inspiring medication at the doctors office, knowing I’d hit the Empty Light soon. I felt the helium in my balloon sag when I was told that I’d have to jump through even more hurdles to get my New York Teaching Certification.

Today I had to bow my head to the goddess of infertility, to my dog’s flimsy digestive system, and New York City Bureaucracy, and say, Alright, ye evil life forces, take the reigns: I lose. I am reminded that I am not the wind in my own sails, I’m just a mixed metaphor with a stupid uterus.

So I cried on the subway.

Having forgotten my ill-advised choice to purchase non-waterproof makeup,  I came home and just wailed with Jeremy until he squeezed my life-bruises away with funny puns and hugs. And even though I was reluctant to surrender to his assurances, his clever jokes, and his lanky snuggles, he left me with little choice. He lets me wallow just the right amount and then mops me up when the time is right.

He didn’t tell me that I had a scar of mascara across my face, because he’s a really good husband. He just let it stay there all night until I finally noticed it myself in the mirror in surprise.

“I don’t mind it,” Jeremy shrugged, “I just like you.”

Jeremy. Man. He squeezes away my life bruises but lets me keep my mascara scars.

And so I left it there, my mascara battle scar, my visible proof that today happened, and I survived. It’s here with me as I write this post, as I wind the egg timer for another day, as I refill the gas tank, as I blow up tomorrow’s balloon.

My Mascara Scar, it says, “You survived, you survived, you survived.”