“Remoted - Hybrid” – Day 570 (Thursday)

This has felt like the longest week in the history of weeks. It might be the recent return to the office and the disruption of the rhythm and groove that was fine-tuned over the past 18 months. The pre-departure time again spent dealing with makeup, wardrobe, lunch packing, dog wrangling/diapering and commuting to start the office-office days feels wasteful. I have no idea how I used to do this five days a week, every week. The chair at the office-office, which was fine for years, feels like a torture device with body parts going numb.

It was a luxury to have been able to throw on the same clothes for several days, hit the computer, and already be working during the time now spent preparing to depart and drive.

Added to the extra effort needed to leave the house is the return of sleep issues and the burning cloak of fatigue left in its wake. For the past week or two, sleep has become an elusive thing. There is the attempt to get comfortable and lying awake for what feels like forever. Sleep arrives for what barely qualifies as a nap before waking up because some body part is numb or twitching, then another forever stretch spent trying to get comfortable and back to sleep. After another stretch of barely a nap, Winston needs to go out, and after another five second sleep, it’s time to get up.

The sleep thing feels brutal after the stretch of remote work when sleep was restful and easy every night and was as simple as going to bed, closing my eyes and being asleep. If I hadn’t been doing exactly that for most of the past 18 months and until just a few weeks ago, I would think the idea was made up nonsense.

Maybe it’s the return of the old October and April seasonal insomnia which had blessedly not made an appearance for just enough years for me to get comfortable. Maybe it’s stress or an emotional hangover of the past two months with losing my brother, losing Moose, needing the new water tank, fighting the mice, and all the other bull crap that has crept in around the edges.