Bullet-brain; Or, my list-making mania

I keep asking my son if there's anything I can do for him, and this morning I told him it's perfectly fine if the answer is Go away and leave me alone. Sometimes the sick guy needs company and sometimes he doesn't. But I'm here for the duration with little ability to make him better, so instead I'm making lists.

What I need from campus:

• permission to teach my class online for, possibly, the rest of the semester
• a webcam
• my Norton Anthology of American Lit, which has been slowly disintegrating since last year but I didn't buy a new copy since this is the last time I'm teaching the class
• the exams my students will take in my absence on Friday (so I can grade them)

What I need from home:

• more clothes because I packed stupidly and I'm already running out of clean underwear
• the book that should have arrived in the mail yesterday
• the mail, because how will I pay the bills if I don't see them?
• assurance that the house is surviving without us and that any dead mice have been properly disposed of

What I need in Columbus:

• a place to stay for, maybe, a month
• a visit with my former student who's letting me do laundry at her house
• an excursion up Pierogi Mountain
• better weather so I can go outside and touch grass once in a while

What this ordeal has already revealed to me:

• I have the best colleagues on the planet
• my night vision, barely passable at home where I know the roads, is worthless on unfamiliar city streets, especially when wet roads reflect all the lights
• it really is worth paying a little extra to stay in a hotel that doesn't trigger my gag reflex

Things that have made me feel like crying:

• a visit from my son's pastor, who knows the right words 
• smiles from my English Department colleagues who crashed my class this morning so they could wave at the camera and wish me luck (Best. Colleagues. Ever.)
• a text from a relative offering my son financial support when we don't even know what the bills are going to look like after the insurance company does its part
• a few quiet moments in the chapel holding my husband's hand

Things I need to stop doing if I'm going to stay sane:

• seeking info about T-cell lymphoblastic lymphoma from Dr. Google, who doesn't have my best interests at heart
• recalling all the horrors of chemotherapy treatment and side effects
• compulsively making lists as if they're going to accomplish anything to help

I guess I'd better go ahead and check that one off my list.