Friday 22 December 2017

#350 Making like a tree

I loved drinking water in coffee shops and in meetings. Let the weak have their caffeine and sugar fixes. I was made of sterner stuff. It was a charade, obviously. I'd eaten chocolate almost every day since I was about ten and needed it just as badly as anyone else craved their coffee. I'd never taken to hot drinks though.

While Sarah stirred her latte, I asked her about Christmas and how her move was going. Once we'd been talking for a few minutes, I confessed how I hadn't done all of the homework and that I'd been worried how that would go down. This made Sarah laugh. It was the last week before Christmas. She'd had four client meetings that day and I'd been the only one who hadn't cancelled. Nobody had done all their homework.

As I now rather proudly ran her through what I had done, she made some suggestions about the job search and tried to even out the naive enthusiasm with which I'd taken to looking for communications roles with some cautionary remarks about making sure I was clear on every aspect of what I'd be looking for and to find out as much as I could about these types of jobs rather than simply applying for anything that looked suitable at first glance. I agreed to spend some more time researching between Christmas and New Year.

In the afternoon, Hetal showed up looking very Christmassy and we visited several of the local watering holes as a way of showing her East Dulwich for the first time. We chatted and drank halves of various beers until around seven pm when my energy levels plummeted and I rather hastily called time on what had before that been a fairly cheerful afternoon. 

The abruptness of my change in mood made for something of an unhappy farewell. We talked about it briefly before parting but it left an unpleasant aftertaste. I spent the remainder of the evening at home. It hadn't been the first time my social energy had flatlined. For some reason or other, I occasionally went from enjoying the company of friends, to wanting to depart, in a fairly short space of time, leaving them a bit mystified. Whatever had happened, it wouldn't be the last time I experienced it. A phenomenon to observe further next year.

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