woke up again and it's 2am and the cat's asleep on my chest and he's so warm and I'm not and I'm thinking about that performance review again and it's been sitting in my drafts for three days and I just can't send it and I typed it all out all the stuff she does that’s annoying and unproductive and the metrics are CLEAR but it just… sounds so mean and like I’m attacking her and I read it back to myself and I just felt like a total JERK and I don’t even like her that much but still you know like I don't want to be the reason someone else feels bad at 2am staring at their ceiling but then I also need to get this done because my boss is on my ass and he just forwarded my email with a passive aggressive "any update here?" and I just want to scream like what do you want from me and I’m juggling three other contracts and trying to make rent and the client for the big project is ghosting me again and I really need that money to pay for… everything and my car tires are bald and probably not street legal and so I just keep putting it off. and then yesterday I just broke down and copied the whole thing into an AI and asked it to make it sound professional and constructive and less like a personal attack and it did and it came back with all these amazing phrases about "areas of opportunity" and "re-evaluating workflow efficiencies" and "fostering a collaborative environment" and it was all very corporate speak but it sounded SO much better and I could actually IMAGINE sending it and it didn’t make me feel like a total monster but then I just stared at the new version and realized I can’t even write a decent performance review anymore like I can't even tell someone they're doing poorly without a robot to clean up my words and that's just so messed up and I felt this weird flatness like it should bother me more that I’m outsourcing my empathy to a computer program but it just… didn't and it kinda felt like cheating but also like salvation and now I'm just looking at the two versions side by side and the AI one is definitely the better option for my JOB but the original one feels more ME even if it's kinda petty and childish and I’m just so tired. and now I’m wondering like am I losing my touch with people and my job is basically managing other freelancers and contractors and if I can’t even give feedback like a normal human then what am I even doing and this whole gig economy thing is great for the flexibility and not having to deal with office politics *as much* but then you’re also just… alone and every decision feels like it’s just on you and there’s no HR to filter things for you or a mentor to ask and it’s just me and the cat and this glowing screen and the AI and it's all just so much and I need to send that email before 9am but I just can't bring myself to hit send on either version and the cat just stretched and purred so loud.