You know that feeling when you're just... stuck? Like, truly stuck. Not "oh, I'm trying to decide between two career paths" stuck, but like, you're literally in a mud pit and the only way out is a fifty-foot sheer rock face and also you have no hands. That’s where I am. Or where *we* are, I guess. It’s hard to even talk about without feeling like I’m betraying someone, you know? Like, everyone in this town knows everyone else’s business anyway, but this… this feels different. It’s about my dad, actually. Not that he did anything wrong, not really. He’s just… old. And tired. And I guess I’m just so GODDAMN ANGRY about it. Because you see him, right? And he’s always been this rock, this person who could fix anything, build anything, just *do* anything. And now you watch him trying to thread a tiny, almost invisible wire through an equally tiny hole for these circuit boards at the plant, and his hands are shaking. Not a little tremor, but like, visibly shaking. And his eyes… sometimes he just stops, blinks, and you can practically *see* him trying to focus. Trying to make the world stop blurring. And it’s those little circuit boards, those fiddly, precise things, that are his whole job. And everyone knows. Everyone sees it. Because it’s a small town, and everyone works at the plant, or knows someone who does. So there's no hiding. And it's not like there are other options for him. Not really. He’s been there since he was eighteen. He's good at it, or he *was* good at it. And now it’s just… slipping. And you just want to scream, you know? Because what are you supposed to do? Tell him he can’t do it anymore? Tell *them* at the plant? And risk him losing his job, which is his entire identity, his entire life here? He built our house, for crying out loud. He raised me. And now he can barely see the damn instructions for assembling some new component that probably goes into someone’s fancy smart TV. And it’s dangerous, too. I mean, not just for the product, but for him. He could mess up, hurt himself. And the thought of it just fills you with this cold, hard knot of pure, unadulterated rage. At the unfairness of it all. At the world. At the fact that there's no easy answer, no magic fix, just this slow, grinding decline that you're forced to watch, helpless. And you hate feeling helpless. You really do.