Dear Godfather,

I got your email and I actually managed to read it, and I’m sorry I haven’t responded yet. It’s been a hard couple of weeks and I admit that writing a blog at the same time that I’m writing an email back to you is pretty time-thrifty. I just thought I would let you know why I haven’t responded yet and why I feel so much stress so often, so consistently.

First of all it is springtime, which means that my brain goes into super overdrive in the anxiety portions of the brain… Portions I imagine are greater than the average human being. I’m not saying I’m special or anything rather the opposite I am at the worst possible combination of anxiety, overthinking, underachieving, continue as you will in the negative same as my brain spirals towards ridiculousness. And I know you’re probably going to say that I am not underachieving in the least, but somehow along the path of life, I got this pervasive idea that somehow whatever I do is never good enough, and That thought endures in my brain in the worst of ways. I believe it has probably helped me to achieve what I have in life, but it totally desecrates any sort of thought that perhaps I have done enough.

So I bet you’re wondering what the fairytale illustrated above is all about. It’s actually one of my favorites, the Frog Prince. In the story, a young princess is playing with her favorite toy, a golden ball, beside a well in the forest. The princess tosses the ball in the air and what do you know, it falls in the well. As the girl is sitting there crying in the loss of her favorite toy, a frog appears and speaks to her. Why are you crying, princess, he asked. She explains and the frog makes her a deal. I will fetch the golden ball, he says, and in exchange you must take me to your house, let me eat at your plate, and sleep in your bed. So the princess agrees, and down the frog dives to the bottom of the well and appears at the top of the water with the ball in his mouth. He spits it out into her hands, and the princess runs away to her castle. Later that night as she is eating dinner, she hears a knock at the door. The valet answers the door and there is the frog, exhausted, at her doorstep. The frog explains himself to the king and, being a good father, he demands that his daughter fulfill her promise. So she lets the frog eat at her plate although she refuses to eat anymore, and at her father’s prompting she places the frog on her bed at night. The princess goes to bed and miserable and disgusted. But when she awakens in the morning there is not a frog on her pillow but a handsome, assumedly single prince. He explains to her that he was under a spell and that he had to get someone to treat him with kindness before he could become a prince again. He whisks her away to his far more amazing palace, and they live happily ever after.

Isn’t that a great story? Such glaring omissions of exactly how these things happened, but that’s fairytales for you. In my mind, the frog prince is about mental illness, and how you still have to keep promises and do the right thing even when it feels miserable and disgusting. You’re not always rewarded in the end but sometimes you do get a far more fantastic palace.*

The other reason that I’m feeling so stressed is that finals are upon us, and I have a lot of work to do:

Reflexive (diversity class) 8-10 page essay with min. 6 in-class sources and 2 outside research sources

Practice class 8-10 page family assessment based on the film “Pieces of April”

Research class final essay 2nd draft submission and PowerPoint presentation

Macro class- PowerPoint presentation, 3 page essay on Macro project at practicum, resubmit final essay from last term, practicum instructor evaluation, and submit macro hours.

I wrote to my macro instructor and told them how much I was overwhelmed, considering that my macro practice at my practicum has been integrated into the actual practicum program so I have no idea how many independent hours I spent doing all of these things. That was Thursday and I haven’t heard back yet at all so I guess I’m on my own. It’s actually rather disappointing because this professor has been incredibly kind and helpful to me throughout my program, but from what I understand he’s catching a lot of flak for being too easy on people so I suppose I am in that wreckage. **

All in all, godfather, thank you so much for giving me the inspiration to write a little longer and more cohesive blog that I have lately. I really do enjoy this time writing, and I really do love you so it was a good combination. All my love from Salt Lake,

Your Goddaughter

* The original story has a side character named Harper’s or something, who is a valet for the prince who has been searching for him for God knows how long, and it actually has a paragraph about how happy he is to have his prince back although it’s not mentioned at any other point of the story. It’s one of those weird side details that never made it to any sort of Disney adaptation.

** I just got a notification that he wrote me back. Perhaps it will be a good day after all.