October 23, 2023: A single email address, digital order and Anna's sign of life
23rd October 2023. When I woke up, I lay there for a while and decided to turn on my phone. As I went on WhatsApp, I received a message from an unknown number. As I read the text, it was clear to me: it was Anna. She reached out again:
"Hey Alexander, thanks for getting back! I've been really busy lately and still don't have Wi-Fi in my apartment, so I'm not very reachable right now, but it's slowly getting there. How are you?"
I haven't replied yet because I didn't know what to write to her, and I thought she had ghosted me.
No one was around. While I heated water for my lupine coffee, I went into the bathroom and washed my face with cold water to wake up. I also examined my teeth for any changes since I hadn't used toothpaste for 10 days. The teeth felt smooth and shiny. My tongue was as white and free of plaque as it had been for a long time after waking up. My mouth also felt less dry in the mornings.
After breakfast, I enjoyed the sun on the balcony for a while and read the book "Think Again."
After that, I took care of some organizational matters (getting proof for my student financial aid because they think I made too much money with securities during the time I received financial aid) and then deleted the old emails that were set up for forwarding to the main email address.
Laura went with Mom to the emergency room while I continued writing my life story at home. At 6:40 p.m., I replied to Anna:
"Hey Anna! Your message came as a surprise. I actually thought you had ghosted me and forgotten all about me. I'm feeling great - even better now that I've heard from you again. And how are you feeling (besides being stressed)? Did you move into a shared apartment?"
Then I relaxed a bit and opened YouTube, not to watch random videos, but to listen to Disney music like "Once upon a December," "I See the Light," or "Frozen: Let It Go" while fantasizing about my first meeting and subsequent meetings with Anna.
She replied at 7:00 p.m.:
"I didn't ghost you, you've still been on my mind. There have just been a lot of things going on lately, and there's also been some stuff happening in my friend circle, sorry about that. The whole hustle and bustle is slowly calming down, and I'm getting back into student life, which is a good distraction.
No, I've ruled out the shared apartment chapter and now live alone."
Mom and Laura didn't come back home until around 11 p.m., Julien cooked potatoes with asparagus and hollandaise sauce, and then we chilled in the living room, the TV was on, I told him about my past because he was asking me, while I read the "Think Again" book and thought about what I could ask Anna on the first date. During the commercial break, I realized how exhausting a television can be. I'm so glad to be rid of it!
When Mom and Laura came back, we had dinner late (me too), and Laura said she had some kind of glandular fever. After that, I brushed my teeth without toothpaste and used dental floss to clean between my teeth.
Micro-Changes:
- I deleted all my email addresses (except one). I now have only one email address for personal and professional use.
- I consolidated some documents in the accounting folder. It's too messy when a scanned letter in the accounting folder is spread over multiple PDFs with page 1, 2, etc. I combined the individual pages into one PDF.