The School Form Needed Signing and I Felt Irrationally Offended by the Pen

Dear Delyara, It was only a signature. That’s what made the emotion around it feel ridiculous and real at the same time. One more line. One more date. One more quiet administrative demand entering the evening while dinner was already on, the kitchen was already noisy, and my own energy was already somewhere far beyond “just one quick thing.” I picked up the pen and actually felt annoyed by the existence of the form, the school, the evening, and the whole machinery of life that keeps finding women and handing them one more small legal-feeling task at the exact moment they have become least emotionally available for anything official. I signed it. Put it by the bag. Said nothing. Still, something about that little square of paper stayed under my skin longer than the signature took.