Reflecting on Daily Routines and Changes

The wind was fierce, the sky cloudy, leaves from trees were torn up in waves by howling winds, whistling sounds seemed to circle around like a distant foghorn. The road was filled with trees that had lost their leaves and lay motionless for long hours under the asphalt. I felt rather groggy, lying on a bench outside an empty shop on the street, writing my thesis. It had been several days of this sort.

For lunch, I went to a Somali restaurant. The lamb and buns were delicious. By myself there; just the two old folks in front of the counter. Later, the bar tender told me that he was the father of a couple of children who came into the store running around, speaking in languages incomprehensible to me. The day before, I had gone to a Khmer restaurant and it had been as quiet as this one.

In the caf, my mind wandered. Did I feel any better today? The heater was on but still too chilly, with a sort of blah, blah feeling. Looking out the window, the sky seemed to be as dark as ever. I couldn’t tell how long I’d been there. Time had become something perplexing.

When I got home in the evening, it felt like an eternity had passed, though I had only done a little work and eaten. The street was quiet at night, with few people around except for a couple of old-timers who walked together. The fluorescent lights flickered as if they were alive. The coffee shop felt rather cozy inside; some worked on laptops or read, others just sat in comfortable chairs.

I looked out the window and thought, “What am I doing here every evening? It’s as though I’m stuck in a cycle of routine.” The heater was on, but it was so cold even the car’s system had stopped, just me slowly driving through the city, passing only that illuminated area. When I got home, I felt something was missing, like the place where things had gone wrong had been left empty.

I spent an hour watching TV and then returned to work. The world changed again. My thoughts cleared up from yesterday’s muddle and began to focus on the present. Nothing was quite as it was beforeso quiet now. A sense of normalcy came over me, a strange kind of comfort in seeing only the daily routine.

When I stepped out of the caf one evening, the first thing I noticed was that it had started snowing outsidea little, but enough to soak up all the sound of passing cars. The world seemed rather flat now; a mass of gray and cold. The streets were quiet, but the wind carried the sound of distant traffic.

I walked home through the first snowfall. The world felt rather smallyet so vast at once. The weather was cold, but I didn’t mind. The way home felt as though it had taken forever, even though I’d only been out for a couple hours.

The next morning, I went to a caf in the heart of town. It was always crowded there, with people reading or writing. I ordered a cup of lattetheir coffee was just as good as any barista could makethen I went back to my own place and made myself breakfast. It felt like a different world.

But when I got home that evening, I felt as though my day had been cut short. I couldn’t understand how things had gone so wrong in the past few days. The weather was cold; the heater kept tripping. When I tried to turn it on, it just hummed. My mind wandered back to the cafso quiet and peaceful, so far removed from the chaos outside.

I think about the routine that had been established since moving here. It’s so easy to get into a cycle of doing the same things every day without even thinking about why you’re doing them. But when I thought about the time I’d spent at the caf, the people who worked there, their faces, their stories… How could they manage such a busy life? Their world was full of possibilitiesmaybe mine too.

I walked back to the caf and sat down outside under a tree. The wind was still howling through the streets, but it didn’t seem to bother me anymore. The only thing I could feel was the cold, which now felt like a distant memory. When the world stops spinning, you have to find something else to keep you from going crazy.

The streetlights outside were flickering in the cold night aircold and gray, with no one around to see them. There was no one to talk to either. I stood there for a long time; my mind wandered. When I looked up at the sky, it still seemed as though nothing had changed since yesterday.

The next morning brought an unexpected surprisea little snow flake landed on the window and rolled away without anyone noticing. It fell off in all directions like a single drop of rain falling through a blizzard.

When I got home that evening, I felt as though I’d been waiting for someone to come into the housethough no one had. The world felt so strange now; yet somehow it was also… easier? There was a sense of normalcy in the quiet. I couldn’t tell you how long I sat there, staring at the ceiling and wondering what tomorrow would bring.

I went out again that night to buy some milk for breakfastjust to see if I could find any solace in the cold world around me. The streets were empty except for a few people walking home from work. It was quiet, so quiet. When I got back into my car, I felt as though everything had gone wrongbut somehow it also felt easier.

The next morning brought a surprisemy apartment looked as though it hadn’t been cleaned at all. The floors were covered in snow, and the windows were blanketed with ice. My bed was cold, and I couldn’t get comfortable for more than five minutes before my back would start to hurt from the cold.

I spent most of the day trying to put things back where they belongedtables on the floor, books scattered about like soot left behind by a thousand fireflies. The only thing that made me feel any better was the coffee I drank in the morning and the hot water bottles I kept by my bed.

When I finally got home that evening, everything felt as though it had been through some kind of purgatoryyet somehow it also felt more real now than ever before. The world didn’t have to be consumed in order for me to exist within it; it just needed to keep moving along…

But when I looked at the ceiling again, it still seemed as though nothing had changed since yesterday.

The streets were empty, and the wind was howling through them like a crazy old man with no idea where he was going. The only thing that could be said for certain about this world is that it wasn’t what it used to be.

I walked out of my apartment one morning and stopped at a caf on the cornerjust to see if there was something in here that I might have missed or forgotten since moving in. It was quiet, just like all the other cafs. The only difference was that this place had never been empty before.

The first thing I did when I sat down was reach into my pocket and pull out a small black boxsomething that looked like a phone but wasn’t anything like one of those things you could do anything with. It had no buttons, no camera, just a screen. When I touched it to my ear, a voice came throughit was like the sound someone might make when they were trying to tell you something important.

The person on the other end of the line said that I needed to come into the caf for an interviewsomething about a new client who’d just walked in and taken all their seats. He told me not to wait, but since he didn’t say anything else, I had no idea what kind of trouble I was in.

When I got back to my apartment, it felt as though someone had thrown a bunch of darts at the wallsleaving targets that were hit right on center with no intention whatsoever. Everything was changed overnightlike everything I’d ever known had been blown away by a single, catastrophic event.

But when I looked around and saw all these changes, I couldn’t help but feel a strange sense of calm. Even though this place was completely different from the one that had once been my home, it still felt like a part of meeven if only for an instant. There were so many things that hadnt changedlike the way the world worked and the way people acted… It was as though nothing had really changed at all.

The next morning found me sitting in my favorite chair, staring out at the street againbut this time there wasn’t anyone to look at me or talk to. The silence felt so strange, yet somehow it also felt more real than before. I didn’t know what I was going to do todaymaybe just lie around all day and watch the snow fall.

The first thing that happened when I got up was that someone knocked on my door. It was one of those mornings where the coffee machine was still making its familiar brewing soundbut this time, it was accompanied by a soft knock at the door instead of the usual brewing gurgling out of the machine. When I opened the door, there stood a man in a suit who looked like he’d stepped straight out of a moviethat’s how real he seemed to be.

He introduced himself as a friend from the citysomeone who had come all the way just to see me and talk about the things that mattered mostto whatever it was I might have been trying to work on. He told me not to worry about anything and that this place was going to change everything for the betterbut when he said that, there was something in his voice that made me feel as though he had no idea what he was talking about.

I spent the rest of the day trying to figure out how to fit all these new things into my lifehow to make sense of them and turn them into part of who I was. There were so many changes, so many things I didn’t know about that it felt like I had just been thrown into a world that I’d never imagined existed before.

But then again, maybe this place wasn’t so bad after all. Maybe there was something to it after alland if only I could figure out how to make the most of it…

The next morning found me sitting in my favorite chair againbut now there was someone else in the room. The first thing that happened when I looked up from whatever I was doing was seeing a man with a bag over his head walking into the cafhe must have been carrying something heavy enough to be taking it on purpose.

He placed the bag down and stepped right into the center of the room, where everyone else was gathered around. When he sat down, there wasn’t a single empty spot left in the placeit seemed like every seat had just been filled with someone who knew exactly what they were doing.

I tried to ignore himreally triedbut all it did was make everything feel more real and more complicated than before. There was so much going on here that I didn’t even know how to begin to process it. The world felt as though it had suddenly grown bigger in every direction, and yet somehow it also felt more small than ever before.

I spent the day trying to figure out what all of this meanthow to make sense of it when there were so many things going on at once. There was no time for me to sit back and think; I had to get right down to business if I wanted to survive in this new reality that had been thrown at me.

But then again, maybe there was something more here than just the usual chaossomething that could be turned into a good thing if only I knew how. There were so many possibilities floating around in my headthat kind of freedom that comes with exploring new territory and facing unknown dangers…

The night before last had been one of those days where everything felt out of placebut now, after what happened today, it didn’t feel like anything was out of place at all. The world had changedcompletely, totallyand yet somehow, even though I couldn’t believe what I was seeing, there was a part of me that still believed in the possibility of change.

But then again, maybe that part of me was just being too hopefultoo optimistic to believe that everything could turn out for the best. There were so many things about this place that didn’t make sense at alland yet, somehow they did… I didn’t know how it was possiblebut whatever it was, I couldn’t help but feel like there was something good waiting just around the corner.

I walked out of my apartment one morning and into a world that had no idea what it had been missing. The streets were quiet againquiet in a way that made me realize just how much I had missed themand yet, at the same time, it felt as though everything was still there…