The Terror of Knowing

Inspired by Emily Diana Ruth’s Letters to July series, along with Carrie Hope Fletcher’s re-jigging of the concept for her own Letters to Autumn seriously, I thought I would write a little snippet each day to the lovely month that is October. So here goes nothing…

4th October

October the fourth, you were a day of laziness, as all Saturdays should be – a day of pre-rest so you can really enjoy the day of rest that is Sunday.

You were a day in which a quick trip to the on-campus Post Office and pop into Spar for milk were really the furthest I would exert myself. You started off gloomy and drizzly and I didn’t expect the day to get any better from there on in. So I holed up in my room, October, and finally got down to organising myself ready for the start of the term/year on Monday. I always feel better once I have a diary and a colour coding system, with the obligatory neon post-it markers highlighting important deadlines that only seem pressing when they are right on top of you.

And nothing seems particularly on top of me right now – despite the reading lists I ought to have tackled over summer – so that feeling is probably more to do with a wilful and blissful ignorance of what is to come. An oddly relaxed bubble which will inevitably pop once seminars begin, even if I might be a little grateful for the proverbial kick up the backside which they ought to be. Because 4th October, you were a day when it took me 4 hours to read some 80 pages, a dismal reading rate by all standards, because I just got too distracted by singing along to the Les Misérables soundtrack. This is not the first time this has happened!

So yes, you were a day of solitude, of holing myself up in my room with a cup of coffee and a book as I tried to figure out what my reading space would be in my new room, but I think I have it sorted now which is quite enough productivity for one pre-rest day.

(Previous day?)