Small Parcels, Steady Ground

Please click the photo above to play the daily videoThe second day back is always kinder than the first. Nothing about the work had changed overnight, but I had, slightly. The edges were softer. I knew where things were again, and more importantly, I’d stopped expecting a sea view every time I looked up.

The day began with a small, genuinely lovely surprise. Eileen, our pharmacist, had just come back from the UK, and she’d brought me something: a box of chocolates and a Jellycat. I’d like to report that I received both with dignified restraint. I did not. There’s something disarming about being handed a soft toy as a grown adult in the middle of a working morning. You can’t hold it seriously. It simply won’t allow it.

I’ve always maintained that the best gifts are the ones that tell you someone thought of you while they were busy doing something else entirely. Bringing back chocolates from abroad is a kindness. Choosing a Jellycat suggests she has me figured out rather more accurately than I’d like to admit. The chocolates, I suspect, will not survive the week. The Jellycat has already found a place where it can keep an eye on things.

After that, the day settled into being long. Not dramatic, not difficult, just long, in the patient way that some days are. I’ve noticed that long days feel shorter when they start with a kindness. It’s not scientific, but I’d defend it.

By evening, Anita took the wheel and drove us to NSC. I was happy to be a passenger, a role I’ve come to appreciate more with age. You get to look out of the window and hold opinions about other people’s lane discipline without having to do anything about it.

We did some shopping, which I’ll describe as purposeful rather than necessary. There’s a difference, and Anita understands it better than I do. I mostly carried things and offered views that were neither requested nor acted upon. It’s an arrangement that has worked for a good many years.

Then the car needed a top-up, and we charged at the TNB headquarters just across the road. I’m still adjusting to this business of planning around plugs, and I’ll confess I went into owning an EV half expecting to find it a chore. Tonight it simply wasn’t. The charger was right there, the area felt well lit and safe, and it was a short stroll from where we’d been anyway. If every charging stop were this convenient, I’d have very little left to grumble about, which would be a loss in its own way.

There’s a small irony in charging an electric car at the electricity company’s own front door. It felt rather like buying bread from the baker’s back step. Fitting, somehow, and slightly too neat.

We drove home with a full battery, a few shopping bags and the sense that the week had found its footing. Two days in, and the holiday already feels like something pleasant that happened to someone I know quite well.

Blackout

I was halfway through an episode of Downton Abbey with Anita when suddenly it was dark. There was blackout. And as expected, Idlan freaked out from his room.

We soon realised that it was not just our unit. The whole block - as well as the adjacent block - were all dark except far the lights coming from the corridor which were powered from an emergency generator at the basement. The generator also allowed one if the lifts to function which was great in situation such as this.

We decided to stay put. We opened the door to the verandah and just sat there listening to the chatter coming from the guardhouse. The Resident's Facebook face said that TNB was already informed and they were on their way.

It took them quite a while before the problem was fixed and the power returned almost an hour after it went out. Too late for Downton Abbey already now. Straight to bed maybe ....