Save it for the start of the week

It’s 8am on Monday, and I’m in my office at my standing desk with the Sun streaming through the window.

I’m kicking off the day with a frenzied triage of email, meeting prep and multiple to-do lists. Yesterday was bad enough that a second to-do list was created to manage the first one.

Slack is lit up with messages from Indian developers who were busy working while I was sleeping. They need my input on how to proceed.

My schedule for today is packed out, so I need to get as much done now before the West Coast wakes up and wants to talk (3pm).

My partner walks into my office and asks if I want to attend a party. I wince at being distracted.

“We’ve been invited. It’s on Wednesday night”, she says.

“That’s a late invite”, I retort.

“Actually, they invited us last week”, she replies.

“Oh, why didn’t you say earlier?”, I ask, slightly irritated at this late arrival into my triage.

She draws in a longer breath and smiles uneasily.

“I only tell you these things on Monday or Tuesday.”

I snap out of my work trance and look at her. She hesitates again before continuing.

“I know you’ll be too stressed from Wednesday onwards and it’s hard to get you to agree to anything then.”

My work day drops out of my awareness and I feel awkwardly present and painfully seen.

“So… you save these things for the start of the week?”, I ask, trying to make sense of it.

She nods, watching me wake up to the reality in front of my nose.

“That… isn’t good”, I say.

She shrugs, laughs it off and walks into the bedroom.

I suddenly glimpse myself from outside of myself. I hate what I see.

I feel ashamed that my partner has to do this. And some affection that she’s trying to make it work anyway.

I sense how keyed up I am and how much worse it must be at the end of the week.

I’d love to say I turned things around at that point.

I didn’t, but the memory seared itself into my mind.

Burnout and overwork often sound like abstract possibilities that might arrive in the future.

But when I see people circling that place, I remember this conversation I had in my office, at 8am on a sunny Monday morning.

It feels anything but abstract.