January 28, 1965
No school at all today! Whoopee! Back to school tomorrow, though. I just sat around all day. I better get going - I go to a P.J. party tomorrow night. I just sat and sat all day. Ahh! Beautiful! Well, keeping in line with my previous performance, I'm going to cut it short.
January 28, 2006
The loveliest part about exam week was that if you had no exams, you could stay home. Staying home meant a day of watching game shows and cartoons on TV, which is probably what I did. I do believe I have lost my capacity for that kind of leisure, unless I am just bone tired. It strikes me that it would be a good thing to practice, before I find myself in a nursing home bored out of my skull.
January 28, 2023
I am not in a nursing home (yet) but I have retired and moved to a “vibrant senior community”, where I am improving my ability to be less busy. The pandemic helped, in its own weird way. We moved into our new, downsized home two days after all the restaurants and activities here were shut down, and we mainly spent the next three months adapting to leisure. I zoomed a bit (having taught online courses, that was no big deal). I also read more, sewed masks, took up knitting again, and finally established a daily meditation habit.
However, it’s time to admit that I will always be a multitasker, or at least a duotasker. (Is that a thing?) I cannot “just” anything. I cook and listen to the radio, or an audiobook. Knit and watch TV. Meditate and knit. Write and listen to music. So am I busy or am I at leisure? It feels like leisure, because there are no deadlines. My life is so unscheduled that I barely know what day it is, and that is much more enjoyable than I thought it would be.
Today is Saturday. Whatever that means.