One day after another. Rinse and repeat.
Get up, have a shower, brush your teeth, have a shave, get dressed, clear the kitchen, tidy the lounge, pick up the shoes in the hallway, hang clothes on the washing line, fill the washing machine up, switch on the work computer, make a coffee, work until lunchtime, get changed, go for a run, have another shower, get dressed again, eat something quick and easy, sit in front of the computer for a few more hours, switch it all off, go help with dinner, eat, wash up, tidy the kitchen again, go sit in front of the computer and figure out what to do with the monster you have created on YouTube, then finally brush your teeth, and collapse into bed.
Day, after day, after day.
It grinds you down a little bit at a time.
Of course it’s not all bad. In the gaps you occasionally catch up with far flung friends, and are reminded that there is more to the world than this. Sometimes you go to the local pub and lose the quiz. Sometimes you walk into town with your daughters and bank-roll snacks and drinks for them - it’s entirely transactional, but you tell yourself that they appreciate it.
I guess we all go through this from time to time - the never ending ground-hog-day nature of the grown-up world. When you’re in the middle of it, it’s easy to think that there’s no way out - that everything’s pretty hopeless. Of course it’s not.
A “hello” from a friend can mean more than they imagine. “Hi, how are you?, how’s it going?”. The world is suddenly bigger, and lighter, and happier. You sit back down to get on with whatever it is you’re doing, and it’s not such a burden any more.
I think it was John Lennon that said “Count your age by friends, not years. Count your life by smiles, not tears”. I tend to agree with him.