A day that went nowhere

I woke late and told myself the morning still counted. Then I checked my phone and the morning left without me. Messages I did not need to answer. A scroll of other people’s weather. I put the phone face down and picked it up again four minutes later. The light on the ceiling shifted from pale to the flatter white of midday while I watched it do nothing.

I started the dishes and stopped halfway, a plate still greasy in the rack. I folded two shirts and left the rest of the pile where it was. I meant to write a single paragraph of notes for later and opened a blank document that stayed blank. None of this felt like rest. It felt like standing in a doorway without choosing a room.

In the afternoon I put on a film I had already suspected was bad. I finished it out of inertia, the way you finish a stale heel of bread because it is in your hand. When the credits ran I could not have told you the plot with any confidence. The room had grown dim. I had not turned on a lamp. My tea had gone cold on the floor beside the chair.

I went to bed having made nothing better. The dishes were still half done. The notes document was still empty. I said this to the dark without dressing it up as a lesson about rest or a necessary fallow day. Some days simply go nowhere. This was one of them. I slept anyway.