Today Is Our Day



May 25, 2025, 7:45 a.m.
I wake. Dim light filters through the linen curtain. It's actually an old tablecloth found at the thrift store for a dollar or so. The embroidery looks like moths floating in the air. I look at the clock. 7:15 a.m. The duvet is warm, soft, heavy. I have a summer quilt on top because it's been cold at night. I stretch out my legs. They've been pulled into my torso for most of the night. My toes now reach the end of the bed. I flex my feet, pull my arms overhead, lie still.

A clatter of pots. Frank is up already. I rise, wash my face, put on my old tartan flannel dressing gown. We've run out of bananas, he says as I enter the kitchen. Good morning, I reply. Oh good morning, my darling! You OK? I nod. Just tired. Bad sleep. Weird dreams again. He holds out his small, thin arms. Come here. He holds me, rubs my back gently.

I'm tired and feel like folding in half. Immediately I feel a pang of guilt because I'm not the one who is dying, even though I am, every day. The sun is the same in a relative way but you're older, shorter of breath and one day closer to death, I sing in my head. I make coffee, chop some rhubarb and add it to a pot with brown sugar. We have no bananas but we'll have rhubarb in our porridge instead. 

It starts to rain. The sunshine was nice but the garden needs some water now. I review my ongoing mental list. It's like a slow-motion reel that runs through my brain:

Grocery shop (don't forget olive oil and bananas!)
Weed the side garden
Plant the tomatoes
Do the laundry (so much laundry when I have such a meager amount of clothes)
Think of something to cook for dinner (I'm so tired of cooking. Will you cook for me, please?)
Thread the heddles on the loom
Pay the truck insurance

There's more but I put it all aside for now. Perhaps I will swim today. I will drive to Ten Mile Lake, park the truck on the hill. No one will be there because it's raining. I'll slip my clothes off, feel the cold air. I lost my bathing suit somewhere last year (how did that happen?) so now I swim in shorts and a tank top.

An expanse of open, still water. Nothing on the horizon except for a fine blue line where water meets sky. The lake will be cold, just what I need. A somatic experience to remind me that I am alive. I AM ALIVE. Breath in, exhale, slowly walk out until water engulfs me. Heaven. Just me and the lake, the sky above. First stroke and off I go.

May 31, 2025, 8:10 a.m.
I awake to rain. I lay still, look at the clock. 7:20 am. I hear Frank in the bathroom. He pops his head around the bedroom door. Good morning! How'd you sleep? OK, I say. He comes over and rubs my back, leans in close to my ear. Today is our day, he whispers. For what? I ask. It's just our day. That's all.

I smile deeply. I love that, I reply. Today is our day.


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