I have somehow become absolutely exhausted.
I have staggered through the day spending practically every single minute wishing that I could stop doing the things I was supposed to be doing and just slope off back to bed.
I suppose there was no actual reason why I shouldn’t, apart from not wishing to be a failed idle loser in life who shirks away from life’s difficult tasks without achievement simply because they have no determined ambition or creative drive. I am guiltily aware that I can be loftily patronising about people who loaf about when they could be producing magnificent works of art or inventive solutions for life’s difficulties, or at any rate they could at least be getting the dusting done. Hence I generally feel morally obliged to maintain at least a show of decent effort myself, but somehow today it seemed very difficult.
I have no idea why this could be, because it is not as if I have run myself into the ground with hard labours over the last few weeks. I have had a very cheerful weekend, and Mark has been here for ages and ages, but all the same, I feel like a balloon that has inadvertently drifted into a chainsaw.
It has meant that I have had to concentrate very hard, because every time I stopped thinking about what I was doing, five minutes later I glanced around and discovered I was sitting down, gazing absently into space. I managed to create a decent excuse for the sort of shirk where I could sit at the computer and answer some emails, but even then when I came back to the computer later, I realised that I had written about three lines of each email and then become distracted and failed to send them.
In the end I gave up trying to achieve anything sensible. I had intended to go up to the attic and begin to reduce the large pile of ironing that has accumulated, but when I looked at the stairs there were just too many of them to be contemplated, so I left the ironing in a pile at the bottom and thought that it would be perfectly all right there until tomorrow.
I brought in some firewood and lit the fire, because it was raining too much to dry the washing in the yard. Also this will be splendid when I come home from work. It might be summertime but it is cold and damp, and the darkest hours will be chilly, so I thought with satisfaction that I was kindly leaving a present for myself, how pleased my future self will be in a few hours time.
After that I turned my attention to the mildly undemanding job of continuing to sort through the pile of camper van clutter which is still filling the conservatory. There is some urgency to dispose of this, because the conservatory needs to be watered, a job which will not exactly be facilitated by having to avoid the several large piles of sheets and towels and crockery stacked therein.
I washed things and folded things and packed things. I am feeling mildly concerned about what should be preserved and what should perhaps be considered to have completed its life’s work. You might recall, if you have been reading these pages since the last camper van renovation project, that the previous inspiration was a character called Mr. Tumpy, who tootled around in a glorious gypsy caravan that had two large feet instead of wheels.
The decor chosen to create this effect might not blend quite so well with our new aspiration, which is to replicate the Orient Express. I think this might have been rather short of hand-knitted teacosies and flowery-patterned oven gloves.
I might have to purchase some new furnishings. That will be a happy and undemanding thing to do.
I think I will go away and investigate eBay.
With any luck I will be feeling more energised by tomorrow.
