I think human beings are mostly just collections of habits held together by the fear of what our neighbors think. We spend so much energy on the presentation—the external architecture of the self—that we forget there’s supposed to be something living inside it. I’m thirty-two, which I guess is the age where you’re supposed to have a firm grip on the steering wheel of your life, but mostly I just feel like I’m hydroplaning. This is probably going to sound incredibly stupid, but I had a minor psychological crisis today over... well, over my hair. It’s not a big deal in the grand scheme of things, but it felt like everything was collapsing. Being a stay-at-home father is... it's fine, I guess. It’s what we decided on because it made the most financial sense, but there is this persistent sense of identity attrition that happens when your entire day is defined by the biological needs of a toddler. You sort of stop being a person and start being a utility. I think we, as humans, need social mirrors to understand our own shape, and when the only mirror you have is a three-year-old who thinks eating play-dough is a peak intellectual achievement, you start to lose your edges. You start to blur. The incident this morning was just... it was ridiculous. I didn't sleep because the kid had a night terror at 3am, so I woke up late and the whole morning was just this frantic, disorganized scramble to get shoes on the right feet. I didn't have time to shower or even look in a mirror until we were already in the car. When I finally flipped down the sun visor, I saw this... this unmoored creature. My hair was standing up at these weird, jagged angles, all greasy and matted from the pillow. I looked like I had spent the night in a dumpster. I looked like I was losing the battle against entropy. We pulled into the drop-off line at the preschool and I saw them. All the other parents. They all look so... calibrated. Like they’ve been professionally rendered by a high-end graphics engine. There’s this one guy, Greg, who always wears these crisp vests and his hair is always perfectly swept back, looking like he just stepped out of a catalog for "Successful Men Who Have Their Lives Together." I looked at him, then back at my reflection, and I felt this sudden, overwhelming wave of... I don't know, maybe it was an ego-dystonic reaction. I couldn't do it. I literally could not open the car door. My son was tugging at his seatbelt, screaming "Daddy, door! Out! Out!" and I just sat there, gripped by this paralyzing fear of being seen. It sounds so small when I type it out, but in that moment, the thought of stepping out and having those parents see me looking so... unkempt... it felt like a total social execution. If the tribe sees you’re failing at basic grooming, they know you’re failing at everything else, right? It’s basic social signaling. I felt like if I got out of the car, I’d be admitting to the whole world that I’m drowning in this life. I actually drove out of the line. I just... I pulled away while the teacher was looking at us, confused, and I drove three blocks away to a side street where nobody could see. I sat there for ten minutes while my kid cried because he missed the "morning circle" time. I felt like a total failure, but I also felt this weird relief that I was still hidden. I eventually made him walk from the corner while I stayed in the driver's seat, hunched over so the teachers wouldn't see my head through the glass. It was pathetic. I am a thirty-two year old man hiding in a Honda Odyssey because I didn't use pomade. It’s 2am now and I’m staring at the ceiling and the house is so quiet it’s almost deafening. I keep wondering if this is just how it is now—this constant, low-grade terror of being perceived as the mess that I actually am. We all perform, I guess. We all curate these versions of ourselves for public consumption, but what happens when the mask slips and there’s nothing underneath it to hold it up? I’m worried that the gap between the "Dad" I’m supposed to be and the person I actually am is becoming a canyon. I guess I'm just looking for some kind of clarity, or maybe just a confirmation that I haven't completely lost my mind. I’ll probably wake up in four hours and spend twenty minutes in front of the mirror, meticulously constructing a version of myself that can survive a five-minute drop-off. It’s what we do. We perform. We survive. I just wish I knew who I was supposed to be when the audience isn't watching... or if there's even anyone left to be. It's just a lot. Maybe it's just the sleep deprivation. I don't know.