Wordgames and Scrabble

It's Saturday. What started out as a warm and sweaty morning evolved into a humid but still
warm afternoon. Because I started my day a bit too early, I finished my rounds of 30-something patients quite earlier than expected, at around 2PM, skipping lunch at that. Exhausted and sleepy but very much satisfied with my efforts, I found myself alone in the newly repainted and retiled CVS Conference Room. And the same old question pops out in my mind, "What now, Jean?"

After a whole month of cramming during Saturdays for my Monday hemodynamics conferences and whining about my perennial lack of worry-free weekends, I finally had this quiet late afternoon moment for myself. It's not exactly an entire weekend, and it's not even a day. But it IS some time off. This is not exactly a quiet spot by the beach. But it IS quiet. This is not exactly where I'd want to find myself. But I am here and where I'd rather be is still a matter for consideration.

I look around the office and suddenly, it's lonely. Perhaps, nobody ever gets used to loneliness. Perhaps, even I, the Queen of Solitude, used to being alone for the past 29 years, would need company sometimes. I've been waiting for weeks to disappear from the world and find some quiet time for myself. And today, the moment is here.

But why is it that the silence is frightening? And the word I can really ever come up with to describe the day is "melancholy"? Ahhh, melancholy like sunsets and blades of grass, and abandoned ruins, and old broken shoes without pairs.

Perhaps "melancholy" is just a glorified, intellectualized, and embellished word. Edit it and you'll find what is hidden. You'll find "lonely".