Afternoon

The afternoon air is sleepy and cool. I am fighting to keep my concentration, not to let my focus slip. Today is making up for other days of procrastination and digression. The computer hums, the phone rings, the words fly and the task list shortens. I am coasting along in my tiny world of order, achievement and calm. A cloud of self satisfied smugness surrounds me. Then, with crashing, a rumbling and a torrent of laughter and words, the kids rush up the stairs from the school bus. The cupboard doors bang and the fridge door swings wide as two hot bodies push for access to whatever is on offer. The television is switched on at full volume, bags are thrown, crumbs are left and in a gradually decreasing flurry of activity they retreat to their rooms, a bedraggled line of possessions in their wake. Now the piano starts in one room and the voice excersises in the other. The television is still blaring, unwatched. I switch it off as the phone starts ringing again, this time not for me. I put work on hold until tomorrow, or later tonight or whenever I find my concentration again. This is an afternoon in my house.