Thank You but..

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(Image by Tumisu from Pixabay)

There's nothing like a text message for changing your day. To be fair, it doesn't happen very often not least when a fair proportion received are one time passcodes. However, I have to say thank you to my hairdresser because whilst she can't open her salon before 12th April she has texted me an appointment for when she does. Sometimes the mundane things in life can be the most glorious and of course it's making me resist the temptation to borrow Mister E's hair clippers to get rid of the overgrowth and everything underneath it as well.

So after giving a shout out to the hairdressser, here's one too for the audiologist that I accompanied my  mother to see last week. It seems that her latest bout of profound deafness despite hearing aids, can be countered by new technology and a voicemail message has confirmed the arrival of her new aids ready for fitting all within four days of her original appointment.

More appreciation too for the fact that the Covid-19 restrictions are easing ever so slightly tomorrow with the mandate for staying local being lifted. So tell me, therefore, why is it that after more than a year of varying restrictions before which, and in preparation for being confined to our homes, I stocked up with paintbrushes, sandpaper and other decorating equipment that it is only this weekend that I finally decided to put them to use? 

Is it because I need a genuine excuse to decline all those invitations I haven't yet received to meet up in a socially distanced fashion outdoors? Has mortification at my power for procrastination finally overwhelmed me and forced me into action? Am I just bored, or is it the realisation that one day this year friends or family may once again be able to enter our home and are going to shame me by asking why the place still seems to be only half-painted with nothing much changed since their last visit? The risk of humiliation is clearly a strong player here but will it win and mean I ignore the limited freedoms being granted to us?

Strangely, and although in the driving seat, a year of stalling and competing priorities leaves me somewhat unsure as to what happens next. Have I sunk so low that, like some kind of automaton, I do now need to be told continuously what I should and shouldn't do? Is this why so many long term prisoners reoffend on release to be incarcerated securely again within four walls? Alternatively am I extracting every last drop of excitement from life by living without a plan, drifting and simply seeing what happens next? Or, is it a very British response to the vagaries of the weather; I don't want to plan too much for outside and end up being disappointed?

Get a grip Caree, you've some good all-weather gear that could do with an airing or two. 

 

 

Comments

Marksgran said…
I think a lot of people will struggle with 'freedom'. We know it should be ok but how can we be sure? We were told it would all be over before last Christmas and it wasn't, it got worse so how can we believe them now? I know I will not be doing much more than going for a drive to a quiet beach to watch the waves when we can move further than our doorstep! x
28 March 2021 at 22:25
Caree Risover said…
Yes, I think most people are going to be much more cautious than perhaps the politicians imagine although, of course, those who aren't will be the ones who make the media headlines.
28 March 2021 at 22:54
Jean said…
The sense of drifting has prevailed in this house, jobs being put off because there would be plenty more groundhog days to tackle them.
It will be nice to be able to meet up with friends in a socially distanced outdoor fashion (assuming the weather co-operates) but other than that the days will continue with more of the same old same old.
29 March 2021 at 11:00
Caree Risover said…
The same old or new normal as it is alternatively called.
29 March 2021 at 11:17
Treaders said…
I (finally) got out working in the garden today and was just saying to my neighbour how I have all these big plans and then only 10% of it gets done. He just laughed and said "there's always tomorrow, isn't there" and I guess he's right. That being said, my sewing machine and quilting fabric seem to be the equivalent of your paint and sandpaper - hardly (if at all) touched since the pandemic started!
29 March 2021 at 17:17
Caree Risover said…
There are so many things I’d love to do; the list keeps growing whilst the time available seems to diminish but I never want to feel pressed to do anything ever again. That’s a feeling best left behind for good in the workplace.
29 March 2021 at 18:20
Mona McGinnis said…
Paint was purchased last April for the back entrance. It was just completed last week. Finally. Clean the basement has been on the list for 2 years now; it got started yesterday. And in the middle of it, there was a text from my SIL & niece - could they have a deck visit. Yeah! Today there's a spring blizzard and the power just came back on after 10 hrs.
29 March 2021 at 21:56
Caree Risover said…
We all do it, don’t we? Sorry to learn about your blizzard, 10 hours without power sounds horrendous. I noticed today that we have snow showers forecast next week, just as we’d made provisional plans for a catch up with family in the garden. Nature is clearly in charge, whatever we might think.
29 March 2021 at 23:21
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