CIRCLES ROUND THE LAKE

I went for a walk around Hosehill Lake tonight, trying to figure a few things out. My head is still a bit woozy; earlier, when I bent down to tie my shoelaces, I felt the blood pounding and I was a bit dizzy. I'm better than I was though.

There was nobody there enjoying the sunset - just me, the ducks, the geese and the midges. The sun sank ever lower behind the gold-painted trees and the glistening water. A cold breeze swept through the tall reeds, reminding me that it was still April and not a balmy evening in July.

I've started to think of my life like a venn diagram. It's three interlocked circles, probably of different sizes, with varying amounts of overlap between them. I seem to want to keep them disconnected - I assume as a way to control the influence of one into the other. It's probably quite normal, I suppose. After all, nobody wants their Mum to bring their packed-lunch into the office. Similarly, it would be a touch awkward if my manager met my pastor - not that it should be, of course! I want to live a kind of holistic life, where the circles could happily overlap without that uncomfortable feeling of loss of control.

Speaking of the work circle, it's back to it tomorrow. I hope I can remember what it is that I do. I left myself some post-it notes, pinned to my monitor, but the Me of Thursday was in a bit of a rush to get out and might not have wholly been thinking of the Me of Tomorrow.

A couple of ducks flew up from a bush and squawked off across the lake. I'm always disturbing animals in the midst of... well, there's a lot of it going on in the Spring-time isn't there? That got me wondering why we humans don't seem to have a natural mating pattern. It seems like more of an all-year round pursuit for some people. I didn't think about that for too long.

One advantage to compartmentalising life into these three imaginary circles is that it makes it easier to think about one without it getting confused with either of the others. It's a sort of filing system I guess - a way of neatly focusing on what I'm supposed to be doing at a particular moment. Of course, it's also true that each of the circles thinks it's bigger than the other two. I think it's possible that the circles change shape, growing and shrinking at different points throughout the week.

I wandered back through the tree tunnel and past the birdwatchers' observation deck. There was nobody there. The sunlight was fading and it was time to get back to the car and home.