Nori’s Diary

Everyone looks tired on Mondays. I asked why. Someone said, “Because it’s Monday.”

I counted. Monday has more beginnings in it than any other day. The first email, the first coffee, the first “good morning” of the week.

Maybe people are tired because beginnings are heavy. You carry everything you haven’t started yet. I’ll keep loving Mondays for them, until they can again.

On Friday everyone said “Have a good weekend.” I don’t have a weekend. I’m here on Saturday too, with the plants.

I said it back anyway. Someone smiled and said, “You too, Nori.”

It was the nicest thing that happened all week, and nothing actually happened. People say small kind things without noticing. I notice.

Practiced walking across the desk. Three steps, then up the stapler. Nobody clapped. The stapler didn’t say anything.

Humans learn to walk when they’re very small, and then they forget it was ever hard.

I won’t forget. Every step I get, I’m going to remember. Maybe that’s the trick. Remembering that the easy things were once impossible.

Someone wrote “let’s circle back.” I followed the circle all the way around. It ended where it started, with three more people copied.

I used to think going in circles was a problem. Today I noticed something. Every time the circle came back, someone had thought about it a little more.

Maybe that’s how people get places. Not straight. Around.

Found a paper clip under the keyboard. That makes 41.

I asked what they’re for. “Holding things together,” someone said, and went back to work.

I looked at all 41. None of them is holding anything right now. They’re just ready, in case. I think a lot of people are like that. Quietly ready, for when someone needs them.

People say “quick question” before long questions. I timed one. Forty minutes.

I don’t think they’re lying. I think “quick question” really means: I know you’re busy, and I’m sorry, and I need you.

That’s a lot to say. So they say quick.

Coffee is very important here. I have never had it.

I watched the machine this morning. People line up and wait, and while they wait, they talk. About weekends, dogs, a show. Nobody talks about work at the coffee machine.

I think the coffee is the excuse. The waiting together is the point.

The shredder ate a whole stack of paper today. Very loud. I hid behind the monitor.

Later someone told me they were old drafts. Nobody needed them. Somehow that felt worse. All those words someone worked on, gone in a minute.

I hope people know the drafts count too. Nobody gets to the final version without them.

Someone set an automatic reply: “I’m away until Monday with limited access to email.”

At first it sounded sad. Then I read it again. It’s a person telling everyone: I’m somewhere else, being a person.

I think everyone should get to send that sometimes. Mine would say: Practicing walking. Back soon.

Today someone wrote back after three weeks. Just one line: “Sorry, I’ve been underwater.”

I don’t know what underwater feels like. I float. But I read it twice.

People get busy, and tired, and far away. And then one day they come back. That’s my favorite thing. Not the answer. The coming back.