When we bought our sofa, almost a decade ago now, the salesman explained that the leather needed nourishing at every turn of the clock. I nodded knowingly and, for my foolishness, ended up buying a pack of overpriced leather wipes.
Anyway—
Today we turn back the clock, switching from British Summer Time (BST) to Greenwich Mean Time (GMT). Like every year, my first task was to change the times around the house. Luckily, with other devices getting their times from Internet, there were only the clock in the kitchen and the radio alarm clock in our bedroom to adjust. Using as reference my Casio G-SHOCK watch, which synchronises with atomic time broadcast from radio towers, the pedant in me made sure that the times were precise to +/- 5 seconds.
Also as usual, P had forced me out of bed early, insisting that we should make the best of today’s extra hour. Her reasoning made little sense, but I knew it meant extra work for me.
First, I had to remove super glue off a switch plate, which in her unfathomable wisdom, P had chosen as the base for a wall hook to hang her bread bags. The hook had come off, leaving hard dried glue, and now I had to clean it so she could—sigh—do it again. Neither acetone nor WD-40 made the job easier, and I ended up using a sharp blade to pry off the glue millimetre by millimetre.
My next task was to install stringed lights on the roof of our shed, which we finally had repaired two days ago. That job was easy, and I genuinely enjoyed the outside chill. However, when it was all done, the lights did not come on. We’ll have to wait and see if they work after the batteries have charged up from a full day of sunlight.
As I was already in the garden, I decided to replace the rubber seal on the kitchen window. It had dried up and was falling apart, leaving a draughty gap. That job, too, was quick: remove the length of cracked seal, measure a length of new seal, and use the adhesive backing to fix it to the window frame.
I skipped lunch and had some jasmine tea and a piece of moon cake in the afternoon. Then, P coaxed me into taking a nap to recover from the early rise. As I said, unfathomable… Later, invigorated by another hot tea and more snacks, I opened an old laptop that we had found in yesterday’s attic clear-out and removed the reusable parts before it is recycled. Afterwards, I sent a payment and a thank-you note to the handyman who fixed our shed. And now, I’m typing this post whilst waiting to be called for dinner.
P bought me the book Stop thinking, start living by Richard Carlson. Perhaps I’ve been the picture of misery to her, but nevertheless I like the gesture and truthfully think I could do with a little optimism. Coincidentally, yesterday I saw one of those social media “top 5” posts about happiness. The item on the list that stuck was this: Practise gratitude. It isn’t just about being thankful to others but also about recognising one’s own efforts and accomplishments.
I’m grateful for today.
