I work a half day most Fridays and as such have become fascinated with the way the afternoon unfolds. Sometimes I start the day at a coffee shop and by the time I’m walking home, the weekend is mine. Sometimes, I have plans that kick off the second the laptop is closed. And other times, I wait as the possibilities open up before me.
This afternoon felt like an unholding of breath. When I realized my functioning brain had hit its limit, I wasn’t sure where to begin. It’s been a busy and abnormal few weeks and this free afternoon without structure or plan seemed endless.
A grocery store run, a few personal emails, and a balanced checkbook later, I found myself drawn to the swaying trees outside our family room window. I could feel the window for outdoor activity shrinking, lest I be caught in the coming rains.
I moved to my bookshelf, to text a friend back about something I’d read earlier this year and that’s when I saw a different book that I’d finished last month—a book I’d known from the start would be fascinating to another friend of mine. It had been on my mind to mail the book to them but then again, isn’t it always on my mind to pass a paperback to the next reader? Certainly I would save this for another day when I had multiple books to mail or another reason to walk by the post office—
I looked at the clock. 3:24. I looked at my local USPS hours. 5:00. I found myself composing an address-inquiring text.
It wasn’t on my radar to go to the post office today. And even as I walked there, I had to fight the urge of going for a single package—certainly I have other books I want to share with friends! But does that really matter? If I wait so long to mail the book because of the nebulous idea of “other mailings” will I ever actually send the one I have ready?
Perhaps not all tasks need built up in our minds.
On the way home from the post office, I remembered the empty candy jar sitting on our coffee bar. I swung by the grocery store for a refill and found that watermelon quarters were on an unbelievable sale—so much so that I doubled back and nearly motioned to the man next me. Surely he wasn’t about to walk by and not purchase fresh watermelon? I read the sign twice. Should I tell everyone in the store?
A few blocks from my street, I passed a school sign for a big cash raffle. So lucky I felt after my watermelon excursion, that I nearly called the number to buy a few tickets.
I think sometimes it serves my brain well—that is, having a clear plan for a Friday afternoon. But I think I’m also learning to be okay with the whimsy of spontaneous mail runs and fresh fruit.
At home, when my “works normal hours” partner got out of a work call, I could barely contain myself. “Look at this watermelon!” A smile. “Look how cheap it was!” An understanding.
Perhaps everything need not be optimized. Perhaps a Friday afternoon can be called well spent if it ends with a full candy jar, a smile in the mail, and the prospect of after dinner watermelon.
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