According to my Garmin, I had a very stressful Sunday, and it sent me a reminder to relax, as my stress levels were elevated. I know I’m feeling particularly exhausted now, at the end of the a pretty hectic, but productive day. And I was also tired throughout the day – yawning during brunch (albeit I hadn’t gotten any caffeine in the system), and taking cap naps during the Suzuki concert in the late afternoon.
But it was a busy day:
- I tried to resolve my friction with my gym group friend. I hate losing potential kindred spirits, because I’m so introverted and specific, and so few people resonate with me, that every single potential one is precious. So after a long reflection over several weeks, I decided that it was worth fighting for, even though one friend said I need to get out of this toxic situation, and another friend said that if I tried discussing it and he’s being irritating and doesn’t get it, I should ignore him, waste of energy. I wrote an email explaining my POV – I wanted to clear the decks, clear up the misunderstandings, and smooth things out before Chinese New Year, which is the time for reunion, reconciliation, and fresh starts for friends and family. While I definitely won’t get place fully decluttered and refreshed by CNY, I thought maybe I can have a go with getting my personal relations sorted out. But the person asked me to “GFY” in no uncertain terms. At least I tried.
- AJ came over in the morning and kindly helped with moving O’s bed, so we could access the plug for his table lamp, and he also helped with flipping my Ikea chest of drawers, and pointed out a mistake I made in the build, which caused the piece to be so flimsy. So thanks to his help, I managed to finish building the drawers in the afternoon. I think this is the first time I have hammered nails outside of arts & crafts or home econs-type lessons at school! It was quite stressful when I first started hammering the nails and the kids were screaming and creating chaos – I was really worried I would injure myself! Eventually I got into a groove, and I was really happy when I finally managed to complete the build. What a mission it had been!!
- A colleague – a rare one who I actually like, a HK girl who grew up in South Africa – came over from Amsterdam on a personal trip, so I met up with her for dim sum at Royal China in Canary Wharf, and then had a chat while standing outside the Gail’s in one of the underground malls in Canary Wharf. The kids were all over the place, and got me told off by an interfering bystander… but it was nice to catch up with her in a personal capacity while she was in town.
- O performed at the BSMA Suzuki concert with his Suzuki group. It was really nice – it’s so lovely to see how much he has progressed over the years, and I’m always so proud to see how confidently he performs on stage. But we were scheduled for the late concert starting at 18:30, so F and myself were both tired and couldn’t wait for the concert to end.
- After not having discarded in a few days, partly as my chest of drawers were in limbo and I couldn’t move my clothes across, I finally gathered a bunch of stuff and discarded another pile. Despite all my efforts so far, when I asked the boys if the house is tidier, they were like: “My room is. But the living room is still a mess”. (Fair point) I wish I had more time to really clear stuff out by CNY…
