28th September — The Work

I woke up and the world was grey inside as well as out. The sky over Coventry had the look of a weather system that was in a mood. Daylight had not yet realised it was in fact day time and the air had an autumnal chill. 

I staggered out of bed because I’m at an age where my limbs need a minute to remember that one of their primary functions is to keep me upright. Having made it to the bathroom, I then experienced the temporal displacement caused by my plumbing needing to wake up and allow the passing of waste fluid. 

Washed and dressed, I creaked down the stairs, they creaked in a direct auditory loudness competition with my knees, and made it to the kitchen. Mary was already there, working both the Duelit toaster and the cereals caddy with the dexterity of a woman who invented the phase “multitasking”. 

I got on with making the tea. An interesting anomaly in that I make both tea and coffee. Tea for Mary, coffee for me. We always refer to it as making the tea. Though my caffeine dependency must not be mentioned for fear that the coffee caddy will suddenly start expressing opinions about being so close to the teabags. 

Brew in hand, I let my mind drift around the To Do list for the day. I jest. It’s not a To Do list. It’s a “Things that must happen before a lunchtime nap” list. And being a Monday, most of the items on the list involved logging into a Google Meet and join the other rectangular heads. Where we discuss the workload for the coming week. 

One of those meetings is enthusiastically called “Production”. It is in fact, anything but productive. I find my will to live books tickets, packs a suitcase and leaves with considerable urgency. I’m left as an empty husk. Playing the “guess when it’s the right time to nod” game. It’s a game much like roulette where a misplaced nod can be a costly affair. 

Lunchtime. I’ve made it this far. I re-caffeinate and much on a dry biscuit in the hope the hunger pangs will sail off to somebody else with less need to control their calorie intake. Then, the glorious moment. I set an alarm for half an hour later, and close my eyes.