I took a few days off from work to focus on my blog. To buckle down and write some of the essays that have been bouncing around my brain. Instead, I’ve been lounging around in pajamas, smoking weed, obsessing about work, and dealing with overpriced plumbing and car repairs. Not quite as productive or relaxing as I’d hoped.

A few weeks back, we had an office staff retreat at the Hilton. Enrique was on the planning committee and helped organize a workshop on writing. I skipped it and took the leadership training instead. But those who attended the communications class all agreed: It was meh, and Enrique should have just taught it himself.

“Why didn’t you?” I asked.

He scoffed. “I’d be too subversive.”

“What does that mean?”

“You don’t know? You’re subversive,” he said. “Someone who doesn’t follow the rules. Who does things their own way and dismantles the system from within.”

“Oh my God,” I squealed. “Really?? Wow!! Thank you!!”

I was beaming. Enrique laughed. “I can just see you telling Mr. D, ‘Hey, guess what! I’m subversive!'” (Which is exactly what I said when I came home that night.)

I can’t think of a better compliment.

I’m feeling a bit subversive right now. It’s part of the reason I took these past few days off. Though I really did just want to relax a bit.

I smoked a bowl this morning and went to lunch with my dad. I don’t think he could tell I was high, though he’s just as oblivious as me. Anyway, he told me that my mom found a cyst and hasn’t been to the doctor, and we both agreed she needs to go, and I said it was part of the reason I took the time off. I just wanted some mental health days, some hours to myself where I have no responsibilities to anyone.

My mom won’t take the time off. She’s been consumed with grant proposals and her annual fundraising event (held last night). She’s a workaholic, just like her father, and our family has a theory that she brought the West Nile Virus to America in 1999, when she returned from India with a 105-degree fever and still didn’t miss a day of work. Her office has been burgled a half-dozen times, including this morning, and she hasn’t made an appointment with the doctor. I hope she does. Some things are too important to put off, and some crusades–like the Elizabeth Warren-ones she wages against economic injustice–can continue even if she momentarily steps out of the ring.

But she’s a fighter. A subversive just like my dad, though he can be a bit of a dick.

My dad’s the kind of guy who says, “There is no God,” after someone blesses a sneeze. This afternoon we pulled into the large (free-for-customers) parking lot across from our lunch spot, and when a kid in a security uniform politely asked us to move, my dad asked, “Well, what if we were shopping here?” It was rude, unnecessary, and irrelevant. We obviously weren’t shopping there. “Why be an asshole when you don’t need to be,” I asked, and he nodded in agreement. Then we bashed Indians over a delicious dosa lunch.

Afterwards, he took me to pick up my car from his beloved mechanic.

“Do you know how Joe and I became friends?” he asked me, and I admitted that I did not.

New to his role as an environmental engineer, my dad was tasked with fining gas stations who weren’t in compliance with some federal policy of the early 1990s. Joe’s auto shop was on that list, though when my dad spoke to Joe, he found that Joe had held up his part of the deal–he had installed whatever system he needed to. It was his manufacturer that had sold him a faulty device, and after speaking to the company, my dad was told that the business had too many backlogs to worry about the 800 or so they had sold in our small state.

“You’ve sold your last device here,” my dad said. He made a few more calls to a few more people, and two weeks later, someone came out to fix the problem at Joe’s auto shop.

My dad knows his shit. He’s a sailor whose not afraid to take on the big guys and will be the first to tell a major corporation to eat dicks.

Like yesterday. I had dropped my Camry hybrid at the Toyota dealership to check my squeaky brakes.  My rear breaks were down to 2 millimeters, my representative Michelle explained. I would need a fluid exchange and new rotors, too. The whole thing would run around $600. She’d be happy to waive the break inspection.

I don’t know the first thing about auto mechanics, but my dad was with me when I bought the car, when the extended warranty salesman said the hybrid’s regenerative braking system should last “close to 100,000 miles.”

“Fuck Toyota,” my dad said when I called to explain the situation. “Speak to the manager and ask them which of those bastards is lying to you: sales or service. Do you need me to come with you to talk to them?”

“Yes,” I said. “But first give me a ride back from Joe’s.”

Joe’s team did their own inspection of my brakes and found my rear brakes were at 13mm, “practically brand new.” The rotors needed a slight cleaning. With labor and inspection, I paid $80.

“And let me show you the oil,” one of the mechanics told my dad as we walked to the car. “I’ve actually never seen oil this clean.”

I drove home composing my tweets to Toyota, thinking something quick and punchy. Maybe “Eat dicks.” Or #fuckyoutoyota?

Would that be subversive, Enrique?

Am I subversive right now?

My stomach is in knots. My insomnia is back. I’ve been up since 3am, writing more essays in my head.

I’m nervous about work. About the moon. About things coming together in ways I always dreamed.

I took these past few days off to rest and relax, but my real motivation was fear.

“Can a man still be brave if he is afraid?”

“That is the only time a man can be brave.”