Easy On A Sunday Morning
It’s early on a Sunday morning in December. The shortest day of the year is less than two weeks away meaning we’re over the hill on the trek towards longer evenings and the first welcoming chutes of spring. The world is unhurried outside, except for the odd dog walker and others on their way to the shops, desperate for the news or a coffee. Monday is temporarily forgotten as I climb out of bed and make my way downstairs. I punch the digits into the alarm panel and wait for the beep. I pull the curtains in the front room and take in the view, before I wander into the kitchen, fill the kettle and flick the switch. The only purpose I have today is to have none. But that’s easier said than done in a world that only seems to reward being busy. The kettle whistles and crackles at the thought of having to boil itself. I unscrew the lid of the coffee jar and drop a heaped spoonful into one of my favourite mugs. The light blue one I bought in Dunnes for a euro, a bargain if ever there was one. It really is the little things that often bring the most joy. Two spoons of brown sugar are followed by a drop of milk. Always the milk ahead of the boiling water. It tastes better that way. The habits that make us who we are and hold us in our own space.
And then I wait for, nothing to happen.
As I stare out the window I see next door’s cat Suzie wandering along the back wall, alert to what might happen next. As I watch her, my mind wanders back to the capital of cats Riyadh where I lived a few years ago when Friday was Saturday and Saturday was Sunday. I remember the loneliness that accompanied the heat when I first arrived and how I missed days like today when the car windscreen melts in its own good time, spared the shock of a weekday pot of lukewarm water shaking it from its natural slumber. Everything it seems happens more slowly on a Sunday. Even the clock ticks at a more leisurely pace. The dog walkers and the joggers mirror the day, their minds seemingly empty of anywhere they have to be afterward or anything they have to do later.
I turn away from yesterday.
Sunday is a tree that never loses its leaves. I pour the hot water into the mug and stir before I place it in the microwave for thirty seconds. I like my coffee hot. When it’s done I return to the front room to watch a rerun of Match of the Day, the title music catapulting me back to my childhood when I’d jump out of bed really early, put on my Arsenal top and shorts, and run out to the back garden in Celbridge and kick a football in the frosty air. For a couple of hours, I was Liam Brady, Frank Stapleton, or Malcolm McDonald, my breath catching fire on the chill air. I loved those times. Today it really is Match of the Day because Leeds versus Arsenal is the only game to survive due to covid. It finishes Leeds 1 Arsenal 4. One of the good days with Arsenal’s new young guns slowly finding their feet. There were times when Arsenal’s result defined my weekend. But something shifted with the arrival of Abramovich’s money and the skyrocketing TV deals, it’s as of the game lost its connection with the people, surrendered its soul to the point where Arsenal don’t even see fit to mark the recent passing of Ray Kennedy, a hero of the 1971 Double winning team until an outcry from supporters forces them to do so.
I sit still and lift the mug to my lips. Even the coffee tastes better on a Sunday morning.
Afterward, I decided to write. The act of sitting down in front of the empty page takes me back to Riyadh again and those mornings when I’d make the short journey down the stairs from my apartment and knock on Kevin’s door. On my back is a small rucksack containing everything I need for the day. Computer Tick. Charger. Tick. Whatever book I’m reading. Tick. Notebook. Tick. Pens. Tick. Phone. Tick. Money. Tick. Kevin is Jamaican and like so many of his country folk blessed with gentleness and kindness that is easy to be with. He’s not only easy on a Sunday morning, he’s easy every day. Jamaican me crazy man! The weekends are our playground. There, in Kevin’s spacious apartment, we’d sit for hours, me on the sofa and Kevin at his desk, time stretching out in front of us until evening finally arrived. Often there was no need to talk. It was as if in the silence we spoke even more. The feeling of companionship, friendship, and deep meaning that you feel with only a handful of special people in life was present always.
Spending time with Kevin was fun and easy. I never had to wear a mask around Kevin and I’m not talking about the ones we physically wear now, but the metaphorical type that we put on to protect ourselves when we step out into the outside world in case we offend someone by revealing too much of our real selves. Vulnerability isn’t a popular currency in the modern world. You have to be very brave to be vulnerable. Those who take the trouble to go there know it’s where the real self lies. With Kevin, I didn’t have to pretend to be anyone but myself. Kevin accepted you warts and all. That kind of trust is such an extremely precious thing. Perhaps the most precious of all. It’s intoxicating. I hope that Kevin felt the same. Ours was a creative space in every way. I would tap away on my Mac writing fresh material and editing It’s Always Now, as a few feet away Kevin edited his many photographs filled with people, culture and food, the product of a curious mind vivid with the expression of life through the lens. The mention of food reminds me of those wonderful days we spent idling many afternoons after school away in the Turkish Topkappi restaurant, righting the wrongs of the world.
On Sunday’s I leave my phone alone, which is an act of rebellion in itself.
Back in Lucan, after I’ve finished writing, I like to lose myself in a good book. Today it’s Writers and Lovers by Lily King, a story about love, creativity, loss, and the growth that can emerge from the ruins. I find Sundays are perfect for finishing books, the jog through the first half quickening to a sprint as my curiosity gets the better of me. The unfolding story pushes towards the conclusion. When I read a book I find myself jumping forward a few pages to see how long the chapter is. It’s the same when I watch a film gauging the time left. I wonder if this is a reflection of the world we live in, this constant battle to run from the present. Now that I’m aware of it, I make the effort to pull myself gently back into the now. I know a good book because it holds me in its thrall, forbidding me to leave until we are done. It’s like being in Kevin’s apartment. There’s no need to run, except maybe for a trip to the shops to the nearby shop to get a packet of biscuits to accompany the many cups of tea and coffee Kevin supplied. Making tea and coffee was an art form for Kevin, a deliberate and delicate process.
My mind drifts again.
Before I know it the sadness of the last page is wrapping itself around me. A good book is hard to leave behind. Like the aftermath of a treasured relationship, it occupies the space in-between, lingering with the grief and loneliness that follows, making it impossible to move on. A new book feels like a betrayal. The book Writers and Lovers has told me more about myself than I have a right to know. Yesterday one of my closest closets friends referenced my love of the extraordinary. Perhaps that’s why I find the ordinary so difficult to comprehend and tolerate. Maybe that’s why I love Sundays. Like artists, musicians, writers, and poets they are different. Unique, restless, and ripe with the potential for magic to happen. Right now the world seems very ordinary. For the time being, the music has died, killed off by science, but it will return. I’ve always loved meeting extraordinary people and going to extraordinary places. Both have stories to tell, but it seems for now we have to make our own. I love the wisdom that comes with a story and the understanding that it’s in the ordinary that we often find the most extraordinary. Perhaps that’s what makes Sundays so special.
For a moment, I am still.
Sunday is a lonely road, separate from the other days of the week. It is the end and the beginning, bookmarks that bring closure to what has gone and hopes of what is to come. It’s always easy on a Sunday morning and right now that’s everything I need.
I lie back on the sofa and let my eyes fall to sleep.
