“So what are you going to do?” asked my pretty young colleague as we were walking together to the gate (she has a fob to get out; I don’t). “This weekend, I mean?”
“You first?”
“I mean… nothing, really. I’ll play some games. Did I mention my boyfriend lent me his Nintendo Switch?”
I did remember, mostly on account of the fact that she spent fifteen minutes rhapsodising about New Super Mario Bros. U Deluxe (and I agree with her; it’s very much a love letter to Nintendo’s history) earlier in the day.
“So what are you going to do?”
“Well, I’ve got this meeting tonight, and then for the rest of the weekend I’ll… I’ll…”
And then I just… stopped.
What was I going to do? An eternal question, perhaps, and one for which I genuinely didn’t have an answer. What was I going to do? As much as I’ve gotten to know my pretty young colleague over the past three weeks, I’m fairly certain that “I’m going to sit at my computer, read sex blogs and perhaps play the tile-matching game that lets you see boobs, oh, and I’ll lie in bed doing nothing at all because I am a millennial and that’s what we do” wasn’t exactly the most appropriate, or stimulating, answer I could have given.
What was I going to do?
Even before the COVID-19 pandemic hit, there wasn’t really much that I could say I did. There are multiple micro-actions, of course; today I sorted out money for rent, charged my iPod (and, in doing so, put two more albums on it because I can), deleted some e-mails, read a bit of one of the graphic novels I got for my birthday… and now I’m sitting here writing in my blog.
Part of me likes the tedium, of course. Drinking tea…
[pause while ILB actually goes to make himself a cup of tea]
…and doing very little reminds me of much simpler times, times where I could sit in my bedroom at home, watch porn, write my blog and read fantasy novels at bedtime. In order to give my pretty young colleague an accurate answer, I’d have to say something nebulous like “I’m going to do a rough emulation of what I used to do, only with adult responsibilities now and a fair amount more back pain”.
I do wonder, however, if the most suitable response to her question would be something like…
“…just be?”
Because I never have time for that. If I’m at work, I’m too busy. If I’m at home and the TV’s on, it’s too loud. If it’s late, I’m too tired. If it’s early, I’m too tired. And, frankly, if I’m thinking about all the things that I need to do, it’s too much.
But right now, it is quiet. I have my tea, and I have my blog, and I’m alone, and the only sound I can hear is the soft tap of my fingertips against the keyboard.
So, for now, I don’t need to be doing anything this weekend. Right here, right now, I’m content to just be.
The idea of “do” is so foreign to me, especially given the ‘new (not) normal’ of the past 13 months… What do I “do” on the weekends?
I work sometimes. Like, WORK, work.
But even when I’m not doing career work, I work. I have a house and a yard to maintain/fix-up/clean, chores to do, groceries to get — the minutiae, as you say — but the necessity for those ‘doings’ is not minute.
Sometimes I long for Mondays, just to get a break from all the work I do on the weekends.
But usually, if I’m “doing” something on a weekend, I’m reading.
Books.
(Real books.)
(The kind with spines and print on pulp.)
So my weekend – while it may not involve much ‘doing’ – is booked. π