I’m quicker with sentences than I think I am. Something ends, I give it a name, and that naming feels useful in a very ordinary way, like putting a lid on something so I can carry on without checking it every few minutes. I don’t sit there choosing to do this. It happens before I notice. What I notice comes later. I’ll be in the middle of the day and realise I’m still holding myself a bit tightly, or staying alert when there isn’t much to pay attention to, and it feels slightly off because, in my head, that moment was already wrapped up. …
Still Learning to Leave Working Things Alone
I keep bumping into this gap between what I already know works and what I still find myself reaching for, and it doesn’t feel like a contradiction so much as a habit I haven’t outgrown yet. On some level, I understand that the things that actually build over time tend to be repetitive and fairly plain, the kind of actions you can do without much thinking once you’ve learned them, and yet there’s another part of me that keeps waiting for effort to feel more alive than that. The discomfort doesn’t show up as overwhelm. It’s subtler. A kind of …
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Standing at the Back of My Own Line
I’ve been trying to name a feeling that doesn’t really want a name. It’s not exhaustion exactly, and it’s not confusion either. Days move along, things get done, and if you asked me what I did, I could tell you without lying. Still, there’s this sense that I’m slightly out of frame in my own life, close enough to be involved, not close enough to feel fully there. Like I’m walking alongside my intentions instead of inside them. I notice it most in how easily I adjust without thinking. Someone else’s urgency sets the tempo. Someone else’s …
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The Second That Stayed
I was already sitting there, screen open, cursor blinking in that patient way it always does, and this should have been the easiest part, the part where you just start and let the rest sort itself out, except my body stayed put, not frozen, not resisting, just not moving forward yet. That surprised me more than it should have, because until then I’d trusted starting to take care of itself. I’d built my days on that trust. Sit down, begin, let momentum do the boring, useful work of carrying me through. Even when I felt tired, that first step …
I Didn’t Get Up
The meeting had already started and I was still sitting there, which I realized only because I could hear people talking and no one was waiting anymore. Normally that’s enough to get me moving. I’m already halfway up, fixing it before it becomes a thing. This time I stayed where I was, chair turned a little, one foot out of the shoe, hands resting like they’d forgotten their job. The morning had been fine in that busy, controlled way. Messages answered quickly. Things closed once they were almost done. Lunch pushed aside because something …
Somewhere Between Starting and Staying
A while back, I noticed that I could spend an entire morning at my desk and still feel unsure about what I’d actually done. Not because I was distracted or wasting time, but because I was busy in a way that left no footprint. The document would be open, the last paragraph reread a few times, a word changed and then changed back, the structure reconsidered, the coffee reheated, and somehow the hours would pass without resistance. It didn’t feel wrong while it was happening. I wasn’t avoiding the work. I was close to it. Close enough that …
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The Sentence
The sentence has been sitting there longer than I expected, long enough that I’ve stopped rereading the words and started noticing everything else instead, which is usually how I know I’m avoiding something. It’s a plain sentence, not trying to explain itself or soften anything, and once it’s sent I won’t be able to keep making small adjustments in the background the way I usually do, which turns out to matter more to me than I like admitting. So I leave it open and get on with other things, replying when needed, staying involved, telling …
She Didn’t Send the Message
He said he’d call later and she heard it the way you hear most things that don’t come with a time, not trusting it, not dismissing it, just letting it sit somewhere loose. The evening moved on without asking her permission. Food happened. The kitchen got messy. She sat down, stood up, sat again, and only much later noticed how often her phone had been in her hand without her remembering picking it up. The message came when the night was already tired. He said he was exhausted. He added a quick sorry. He didn’t say anything about the call. …