A Letter to Myself on Sunday Evening, When Monday Has Already Started

To me, on a Sunday afternoon, twenty-seven, standing at the sink with a basket of water spinach,

I know where you are. Five-thirty, the tap running, the sharp green smell of the leaves, the loudspeaker of the bread seller drifting down the alley. Your two hands are stripping the stems one by one, but your head is not here. Your head is sitting in a meeting room, Monday morning, eight o'clock, listening to someone ask a question you have not prepared for.

Fourteen hours remain before then. And still you already feel as heavy as if you were in that room.

Let me say the simplest thing first: nothing is wrong with you. Monday starting on Sunday afternoon is not strange, and you are not the only one standing at a sink right now with your mind somewhere else. It is only that today, it came early.

I remember something from last Friday. You texted Vy.

"It's Sunday soon, then Monday."

"Don't bring it up."

"I only mention it so I remember."

"Why remember."

You both laughed, and both of you felt your Sunday get a little smaller. I think that is where I want to begin: you do not have to pretend Sunday evening is still whole. Some evenings it is not, and saying so is fine.

There is something you have not told anyone, including me. You are not afraid of the whole week. You are afraid of the first minute of Monday morning: when you switch on the computer, when you see the unread count, when someone walks past your desk and asks "done yet?" The minutes after that are usually better than you expect, but you have lived through that first minute a dozen times since yesterday, in your head, word by word. I think that is what makes your Sunday tiring: not Monday itself, but Monday in rehearsal. There is another letter that speaks to exactly this way of living ahead of yourself, to you who always live five minutes ahead, if you want to read more.

I also know that at ten past six you opened the company group chat "just to take a look." There were no new messages. You still scrolled up and down three times, eyes searching for a name. I do not blame you. It happened, and it is also you. A worried person's hand goes looking for something to hold.

So I want to forgive you a few small things. You do not have to be cheerful on Sunday evening. You are not wasting the weekend by thinking about Monday. You do not have to finish every chore before you are allowed to rest. And if your thumb opens that chat again at eight o'clock, that is not a failure on your part.

I want to thank you too. Thank you for still cooking something every weekend, even if it is only boiled greens and eggs. Thank you for closing the laptop last time at nine at night, even with one task still hanging in your head. Few people see those small things, but I do.

If you want to try something, I have one very small thing, a close relative of washing dishes without thinking of anything else: do one short task with your hands on Sunday afternoon, and each time Monday pulls you away, bring yourself back through what your hands feel.

The first time you do this, it will not feel lighter. The thought of Monday will come back ten times, twenty times, and you will feel like someone swatting mosquitoes. That is ordinary. Some people told me they felt lighter on the very first afternoon, you might not. After a few weeks, some Sundays Monday only visits once and leaves. Some Sundays it stays the whole evening, and you finish the greens still heavy. Both happen, and neither says anything about you.

I know that is not enough if the heaviness comes from something real. So let me add: if what is weighing on you is something specific at work, like being insulted or threatened, that is not something to wash greens through. Tell a friend you trust. And if the heaviness of Sunday evening starts on Saturday noon, lasts for weeks, keeps you from eating or sleeping, or makes you not want to go to work at all, please talk to someone with professional training. You do not have to wait until it gets worse to say so.

I promise you one very small thing. Next Sunday afternoon, when you are standing at the sink and Monday walks into your head, I will remind you that it is only Monday in rehearsal, and that you can put it back where it came from. Sometimes you will listen, sometimes you will not. I will not be angry.

The water spinach is stripped, bright green in the plastic basket, water still dripping into the basin. Out in the alley the bread seller has gone far off, the loudspeaker fading.

Stay here a little longer.

With warmth,

Me, on some other Sunday afternoon, a little lighter. Only a little.