An Hour or Two of Calm

Dearest Rachel –

First thing in the morning, I find myself sitting up in bed, firing up the computer and starting this letter to you. Thankfully, I’m not fighting off another cold – the one Daniel and I both just dealt with (although I’m not sure if he isn’t still dealing with the symptoms; like we agreed back in the day, we get the same amount of cold, just spread over different amounts of time) should grant us an immunity against any mutated strains for a while yet – but with little more than an hour or so before Kris gets here to work on the house, there isn’t sufficient time to work out and get myself cleaned up and dressed beforehand. Lord knows, I don’t want to be stepping out of the shower as she walks in the door; that’s a tableau to be reserved for you and (should she exist, and show up) Megumi.

So, despite what I was saying yesterday about the frenzied dealings with tasks and deadlines (including the fact that I had to send a few reports to the auditors this morning that I thought I’d taken care of previously – hadn’t considered their request about breaking the year down by month, however), there’s still the opportunity, even at this late hour, for an hour or two of calm before everything gets started in earnest yet again.

To be sure, part of this is simply due to the fact that I’ve decided to eschew something that’s become a normal part of my morning routine – when you take the gym portion out of the day, it frees up a surprising amount of time. It’s become so much of a habit that it actually feels like I’m cheating to do so; fortunately, for the first time in a week or so, I’m starting the day toeing the two-fifteen line, rather than having to exercise to get to (or, more to the point, under) it.

For the moment, I’m keeping myself confined to the bedroom (and the laundry room – hey, I need clothing options for the next couple of weeks – but that’s as separate from the rest of the house as the bedroom, in any event) for the time being, so as to let Daniel continue to sleep. I’ve no idea when he shuts everything down in the family room and calls it a night, but whatever sleep he can get before Kris gets here should do him good. There’s no point in knocking around where he might hear me and wake up any sooner than necessary. So that adds to the calm atmosphere in the house, even as I’m actually getting stuff done in preparation for our trip.

For what it’s worth, Daniel wakes up before Kris arrives, and as she starts in on various rooms in the house, I walk him through the process of checking in. Yes, the process is all done online this days (which should come as no surprise to you or anyone else who’s either cruised or used the internet, but it’s still different from the days when we were plying the seas together), and several days ahead of time, so we can do this from the comfort of our home, rather than being part of some frenetic crush of folks at the pier. It makes life easier for both us and the cruise line.

On the other hand, the health check won’t take place until the day before we board, so we can’t finish the process (and it still theoretically leaves us with the potential for another Basel-style incident), so it’s not like the process is complete. But we’ve done what we can for the moment, and with that much taken care of for now, we’re able to take in a moment or two of calm before things get crazy again.

Or maybe they won’t; there’s a thing or two that needs to be done yet at this point, but nothing that’s going to take all that long. I still have a bill or two to take care of, but those take but a matter of minutes, and don’t even require getting up from one’s chair. I need to look into my eSIM card for when we’re in London (and, further down the line, in Israel) – I purchased an app, but I need to check with our provider about it, because it claims to not be supported (and I only found out about that after buying it. It’s not even the price of a cup of coffee, but it’s grating to have wasted the money) – but as we’re taking Kris out to lunch like we often do, we can make that stop on our way home. Likewise with the grocery certificates that will be expiring the day we get home – although we could stop there during that afternoon, if we’ve a mind to – we can get some magnetic hooks for the cabin while we’re still out. All this, and we might still have free time to get together with whichever members of the gang would be willing to meet tonight for a light dinner; not to mention the fact that we’ll still have all of tomorrow morning to finish putting ourselves together (or just going through the standard routine).

So, it may well be that the real chaos is only around us in fits and starts; when the dust settles, we can breathe easy and be grateful for it, like right now. Still, if you could see your way clear to keep an eye on us regardless, and wish us luck all the same, it would be appreciated all the same. After all, we’re still going to need it.