typical friday night

It’s Friday night. I’m wearing sweat pants. Tonight’s curry is on the stove. I have just turned on the oven to bake bread. I’m doing the laundry. This is the typical Friday night you don’t want people to know that you have.

Tomorrow is Saturday and the day after is Sunday and what characterises those two days is the fact that I won’t have to get up early in the morning and go to work. Plans for the next two days are scarce. I have got a handful (or 20) of thank you notes to write so I’m thinking that come Sunday I will have baked a dozen apple pies and made some jars of jam in order to not have to dig in to those notes.

While I wait for J to return from football and take a shower, I will sit myself in our comfy chair and look through the news paper and forget that I just checked my work email (why?) and saw that the first hour of Monday morning is already reserved for a text someone else should have written. Forget that while I found three shirts for J today, I found nothing but tights for myself. Forget that the dishes are piled rather high in the sink. Forget. Forget. Forget.

Happy Friday night whatever you’re doing.

long weekend

As we drove home yesterday in an unbelievably hot car, we talked about how wonderful the weekend had been, how we had enjoyed every second of it and how relaxed we both felt.

And then I got to work this morning and picked up the phone and then I talked to my colleague and then I made some phone calls and then I called someone back and sent him an email and then my colleague and I began discussing whether we had done the right thing. And let me assure you that we had not! We had f***** up big time and we had to have someone else pull our chestnuts out of the fire. And that’s not good.

But we were talking about the weekend and how wonderful it was and since I doubt you will believe my word alone, I have got photos:

There was the sunset on the first night of our stay:

And plenty of sand on feet:

And cookies and coffee en masse (those cookies are homemade by the way):

We had time to go berry picking (red currants, gooseberries and cherries) and this is me pitting cherries:

And best of all: We had plenty of time to bathe and play and relax on the beach and if there is one thing I am great at it is doing just that:

the kind of weekend it hasn’t been in a while

If I had known what a great weekend this would be, I would have looked forward to it some more. For the first time in ages J was actually at home and we did things – together.

Yesterday we grocery shopped together, decided what to cook together. And in the afternoon we took the train up north and saw an exhibition. And while we walked through the fantastic sculptures of Giacometti and the even more stunning paintings of his, and afterwards when we walked around the section showing modern museum architecture, we talked and listened to each other and for the first time in ages, we were the kind of partners I have always loved that we are: The kind that want to see the same things, that enjoy the same things. The kind that have so much in common, but also have that tiny difference in our likes and dislikes which makes the conversations interesting and gives you the feeling that these conversations always brings you new knowledge, show you things from another perspective.

After months of having limited time together, I need to adjust to us having all the time in the world. When we eat, I find myself hesitating wondering if it’s okay that I tell one more story. For months I have been on careful lookout for the “I am sorry, but I don’t have time, I am not really present, I am thinking about my PhD” look in J’s eyes. As we sat this morning talking and eating almond croissants, it suddenly hit me that even though we have had our share of Sunday croissants while J was working on the dissertation, I can’t remember the last time we left the table because we had finished talking and not because J needed to work.

I am wondering whether it isn’t so much the weekend as it’s the company and what you do that make the weekend. The past couple of months I have shown up at work Monday morning exhausted and ready for another weekend right away. It isn’t that I wouldn’t love another weekend starting tomorrow if I was offered one, but I feel more relaxed and ready to face next week than I have in ages. And that’s even before I have had a cup of coffee and a piece of the peach pie waiting in the kitchen.

sunday moments

Early breakfast with J before he leaves for the office.

Lengthy shower in a bathroom which – despite still needing a bit of work on the details – I have dreamed of for the past two years.

Minnie Driver: London Skies.

Coffee and an invitation to go watch Atonement which I decline because I really just want to be at home and have the minutes slowly slip through my fingers

Phone call from J who wants nothing else than to tell me he loves me.

Way better mood than yesterday.

Spring feeling: