The cold descends on the Delta as soon as the sun sets, while we’re still swatting mosquitoes.  I hand the dishes of nosh across the railing to my neighbor.  Then we take ourselves over to her house and walk out the redesign of her bed-sit area.

Back at home, I spend more time than I planned scrolling for innovative bed designs.  I sense what might work in my neighbor’s home but I don’t have the physics knowledge to underwrite my plan.  We’ll figure it out.  Then I get caught in a hopeless tangle of attacks by a friend of one of my sisters who has apparently decided to convert me to Trumpism.  I read her rambling paragraphs and then decide to ignore her tirade.  That’s the beauty of the internet.  I don’t even have to hit the mute button.

A pleasant tiredness settles over me.  Morning will arrive before my body has rested, my daily fare.  I still have a vivid recollection of the first doctor who conceded that I will have to get used to that.  “It’s called ‘fatigue even at rest'”, he explained.  “It’s a function of your post-encephalitic state.”  Not my imagination, then.  I felt a surge of relief.  Having an explanation changed only my perspective.  Somehow I found comfort knowing that I really, truly, am always tired.

I notice that the angels shifted position during  my two-week absence.  We might have had a little trembling, a rumble in the underpinnings of our park, the fault lines asserting themselves.  Now the angels face the window.  That seems fitting.  I leave them and go downstairs, to wash dishes, put on pajamas, and crawl under the covers.

It’s the twenty-third day of the fifty-eighth month of My Year Without Complaining.  Life continues.