Sunday was a bit less of a black hole, although there’s a good chance I’ve forgotten much of it because I’m writing about it on Monday night past 11:00. Yikes.
I didn’t sleep much Saturday. Stayed up until past 5 in the morning and was out of bed a little past 8. I called my folks just to check up on them — they seemed to be okay. My mom has been pretty bored but she’s resigned to the reality, which is a lesson most of my fellow Hawaii residents could probably take from her.
There’s a Japanese phrase, possibly more attributed to my mother’s people by Western writers than by actual Japanese people: shikata ga nai. It cannot be helped. It’s undoubtedly part of the Japanese ethic, whether the phrase itself is truly spoken much in Japan or not. This sense of accepting one’s burdens, carrying them without complaining or dwelling on them, is a piece of the overal Japanese aesthetic. The impermanence of all things. The irretrievable beauty of each passing moment.
I could hear it in my mom’s voice. “Of course I don’t like this, but we just have to be patient,” she said. That’s right, mom. Hang in there.
I had a slice of custard pie for breakfast, did one of my three usual Sunday crosswords, read the news, and went back to bed until sometime past 1:00. Or maybe 2:00. I got up and ate the leftover steak with white rice for lunch while I watched Drinking Buddies (2013), a film with Olivia Wilde and Anna Kendrick. Quite a good indie flick, with better acting from Wilde than I think I’ve seen. This is my nineteenth Anna Kendrick movie, by the way. Ten more to go to complete the set.
I don’t know what happened to the rest of the day. I conked out without putting myself properly to bed, and was alternately uncomfortably awake and uncomfortably asleep most of the night. Around two in the morning, I kind of gave up trying to get back to sleep, and drove to the strip mall to hit Longs for some Diet Pepsi. I’d meant to make a supermarket run just before closing Sunday night but although I set my alarm for it I just didn’t have it in me to get out of bed and do it.
However, with fresh consciousness at two, I figured I could at least get the Diet Pepsi, which I was down to two bottles of. That’s usually what I drink but I didn’t want to be caught without one if I needed a third Monday, which I intended to be super productive.
I drove home and drove right back to the strip mall because I forgot to mail my Netlix DVDs back, and I wanted to get them in the mail in time to receive the next discs in queue before the weekend. It still might not happen.
The sun was coming up by the time I crashed again, a couple of hours before my 9:00 a.m. Monday morning alarm.
There wasn’t much texting or messaging Sunday. The group text with Julie, Suzanne, and Cindy (my engineering coworkers) continued our conversation about the gentlemen’s club and the virus. Early reports were wrong, and it turns out the club was probably not infected, at least not by this patient.
Sylvia texted me a photo of her breakfast from Pancakes and Waffles. She had the country fried steak with sausage gravy. I’ve had that there; it’s quite good.
That was it! It was enough. Add the phone call to the family and it was definitely enough interpersonal reaction for a lazy Sunday.
No. I didn’t go for a walk. Darn it.
Somewhere in the day, I ate the last slice of the Zippy’s custard pie, and that’s all I ate Sunday. Two slices of pie and some steak and rice.
It wasn’t much of a day, and I think the weird sleep kind of dominated. I have got to make more of an effort to get some regular sleep. The Darth Vader machine is trying to keep me alive and I’m not letting it.
I’m feeling slightly less need for connectivity lately, but I’m grateful for what I’ve got. I’ve got room, if you could use some of the same. Hit me up in the comments, or reach out some other way.