patterns

In seven days, I leave.

Interesting how we look to patterns for comfort, even when we?ve established there?s a problem in the pattern that needs to change, we still go back to them.

Finish work at four-thirty. I could have left several hours ago with little difference- my workload has practically dropped to zero. I am making a presentation introducing people to our new document management system. It?s a lot more complicated than our current filing system, which is just a series of folders on the main hard drive. The problem with the current system is that if I save a file and then leave, no-one else knows where it is.

The thing with the new system is that people don?t understand it and don?t want to change from what they already know. They are resistant to a new way of doing things.

There?s comfort in the patterns.

I autopilot from work to the station. Sometimes I?ll want to head east instead of west, like if I have to go to Liverpool Street instead of home, but I always switch to autopilot and end up on the westbound platform. Sometimes I?ll be on the train before I realize I?m going the wrong way, I just wasn?t paying attention. One time I went all the way home before I realize I was meant to be somewhere else.

Get off at Finchley Road, go to Sainsbury?s. Stand in one of the aisles, marvelling at all the food. I only make five things, but I make them very well. I think about Aiden, about buying a recipe book, picking a new recipe, someone else?s pattern, going shopping with her, making food with her, trying new things, finding joy in small things, like making food. I smile.

There?s comfort in the patterns.

I?ve been feeling a bit low so I grab a steak, hoping some iron will give me a boost. Grabbing a steak means you also grab mushrooms, onions, peas, potatoes for mashing. That?s how I do steak. There?s comfort in the pattern, you see.

Guy at the till?s name is Hari, he?s a young guy. He looks very tired but not unhappy. He asks if I need help packing, I say I?ve got it. He rings up my purchases.

?You?ve got reward points!? He says cheerily, after scanning my nectar card.

?Great, how much??

?Ten pounds worth.?

?Cool, use it.?

I?ve been rewarded for going to the same place, doing the same thing, buying the same things, over and over. It pays for my shopping. He hands my nectar card back to me and I tell him to bin it- this will be my last shop at Sainsbury?s. He looks a bit upset.

I get home, put my groceries on the bench, slump into the lounge. It?s five-thirty so Futurama is on. I?ve seen every episode a few times but it?s still pretty funny. There?s comfort in the patterns. Fry?s girlfriend from the year 2000 has woken up in the year 3000, and convinces him to go to the year 4000, which is a desolate wasteland ruled by savage children. I know there must be a reset button coming up, that the show can?t stay in the future, that everything has to go back to how it was, that the show must stay essentially the same from week to week, but I?ve forgotten how it does. The problem is in the pattern.

There?s comfort in the pattern.

I cook my dinner and eat it. It?s far too big for one person, as usual. My problem is that I learned to cook for six people, and I?ve never learned to cook for one, so I always make too much, and then I always eat it all, and then I always feel bad about it. It?s good, though.

I should be out with friends, sucking the marrow out of my last days in London, seeing people I won?t see again. I should call Aaron. I?ve never even met Roxy. I should be out, I should be drinking. But there?s something nice about staying in, doing what I?ve always done, knowing that I won?t do it again, not like this. I?ve done this a hundred times before. One more time won?t hurt. A hundred more will.

I play Half-Life 2 for a few hours. Gordon is stuck in an old prison block, and I have to fend off like forty marines before I can move on. They?ve got grenades and shotguns, and I get repeatedly slaughtered. I have three sentry guns, and I put them in different places each time I reload, hoping that I will find the pattern that takes all the marines out before they can get to me. I?ve got stuff to do, packing to do, people to call, letters to write, a novel to finish, but this is the most important thing I can be doing. I feel a twinge of guilt. I can?t even remember most of the games I?ve played, wasted weeks and months on. This is how I spend my last days in London.

I read Chainfire until I can?t keep my eyes open. It is book ten of a fantasy series I?ve been reading since I was a teenager. The hero wakes up to find he is the only person who remembers his wife. Everyone else thinks he has gone insane, but he can?t let her memory go. It?s a hardback, and when I doze off it falls out of my hands and whacks me in the face.

I turn off the lights and think about her, crunch up the duvet and wrap my arms around it, and imagine being with her, and smile. Patterns wheel inside patterns. There?s comfort in the patterns, but sometimes that?s the problem, and you have to break them.