We went to my wife and daughter’s company Christmas party/25th anniversary party last night. It’s a place I worked for the better part of a decade, and nearly killed me with stress. It started a downhill spiral of work that put us in massive debt after a failed store, and then the nightmare that was my last place of work, before I became a fed.

As always, as much as I want to relax, I can’t around these people; it’s like a weird PTSD reaction.

And something always happens. Last time, pre-pandemic, my suit jacket had been in the closet so long it reeked like moldy basement. This year, I put on a pair of dress shoes I haven’t worn in three years, and over the night, huge chunks fell off of them. I’ve never seen a pair of shoes deteriorate so fast.

By the end, I was walking without soles. Insanity.

Everything about that place is traumatic, even their parties.

Target: 1200 words
Written: 1535 words, novella: The Mungk