i’m surrounded by people who love me the way I am.

Affection at close range is mostly administrative. Someone remembers you don't drink coffee after four. Someone texts on the anniversary of the bad year and says nothing about it directly.

The real count is usually small — two or three people, plus a cousin you speak to twice a year. Small isn't thin. A rope of three strands holds most of what needs holding.

If none of it is reaching you today, that's the day talking rather than the arithmetic. The people who know your worst week are still out there knowing it.