Who Gets to Choose Simple Living? A Reflection on The Abundance of Less

I finished The Abundance of Less today. I don’t think I’ll read this book from start to finish again. There are parts of the book that I might read again because some of the people in it have inspired me one way or another. Their lives were at peace and consistent over time. That has remained with me.

What I liked most was how some of them lived without separating things. There was no separation between work, art, and everyday life. Making meals, growing food, making art or writing, or carving wood all come from the same place. There was no clear line between survival and meaning and I can see why that might be appealing because it feels solid and complete.

Some of the people in the book choose to live with less. They kept their needs minimal. They worked with their hands and they were aware of their surroundings. Living that way takes discipline but it brings clarity. You know what you need and what you don’t. However, a tension that was hard to ignore grew as I read on.

In the Afterword chapter, the author mentioned one of his book reading sessions when someone asked if these people were just surviving at a basic level of survival. That question lingered because it sounded familiar. Where I come from, many people already live that way. It’s not a philosophy or a decision made after reflecting on it. That’s just how life is.

I come from an Iban background. My grandparents were paddy farmers who lived in longhouses. They grew their own food and they depended on the land. Life in the longhouse community was close and practical. It wasn’t considered meaningful or spiritual. It was simply necessary and it wasn’t easy. Farming is hard work and the yield is sometimes uncertain. There are limits to what you can access, especially education and healthcare. Many people in these communities wish to have a stable income. They need money to send their kids to school or pay for healthcare. They want to repair their homes or build new ones. They want to help their elderly parents. These concerns are genuine and constant.

When I read about people who want to live a simpler life, I see two separate realities. Some people choose to live with less. And some people have always lived with less. The difference is in the choosing. Choice allows you to choose that life and leave whenever you want to. Choice lets you regard it as meaningful. If something goes wrong, it allows you to return to a system that supports you. But without that choice, that same life would look very different.

In the Afterword, the author asks if small “green” changes to one’s lifestyle are really meaningful. They say that these changes let people stay comfortable while calling it sustainability. The concern is real, especially when certain changes are made more for show than for a good reason. But this perspective doesn’t take into account that not everyone can make big adjustments to their lives. Some people can’t move away from the city, change jobs, or move closer to nature. They can’t make those kinds of adjustments because of their jobs, finances, and other circumstances in their lives.

For them, small changes let them do things within their limits. Making small changes like consuming less, being more mindful, or doing less harm to the environment can still reflect a genuine effort to live with awareness. These decisions may not seem like enough from the outside, but they are based on what a person can realistically change at that point in their life.

This doesn’t mean that the people in the book are wrong. I understand what they’re attempting to achieve. I can see the benefits of living with purpose and cutting back on things I don’t need. I can see they care about the land and their communities. But I can’t ignore the other side either. Moving to a city or looking for a job that pays cash does not mean giving up on values. People are just responding to their circumstances. They are trying to make their life more stable by making decisions based on what they need.

Both ways of living arise from different needs and situations and are shaped by different circumstances. One is often chosen and can be left behind. The other is lived without the option to leave. That difference should not be overlooked. To be frank, this book did not give me a model to follow. It just offered me another perspective to consider and it made me think more about my own life and what I already value. It also made me think about how some ways of living are described and seen in a higher regard.

I will remember certain chapters of this book. The chapters about Asha Amemiya, Akira Ito, Koichi Yamashita, and Wakako Oe are worth reading. They are not offering answers, but rather something that can fuel my inspiration. I will return to those chapters when I need a reminder of some kind of discipline or attention. I will also give my perspective the same weight because it also means something important to me.

I write about Iban culture, ancestral rituals, creative life, emotional truths, and the quiet transformations of love, motherhood, and identity. If this speaks to you, subscribe and journey with me.

The First Hour of My Day

The first hour of my day is quiet. The house is still asleep. I sit up in bed and reach for my phone. I tell myself I am just checking one thing. The time. Messages that arrived overnight. I hold the phone close to my face. The screen lights up the room. I scroll. I do not notice how long I stay there. It is already April. I turned 49 in February, and it has been almost two months. Lately I have been feeling like I am living in a fog.

I want to spend my time on meaningful things: reading, walking in nature, journaling, and reflecting. But somehow the hours slip away. I sit down to check one message, and then it is an hour later and I am watching a stranger argue about politics. I feel hollow afterward, as if I have given something away without intending to.

The word is “attention.” I am reading a book, Four Thousand Weeks by Oliver Burkeman. In one chapter it says attention is the beginning of devotion. Only with full focus can you truly love, care for, or experience something. I thought about my daughter telling me something sweet from her day while I nodded along, still scrolling. I let many such moments pass because I was too distracted. Am I even having these moments? The book asks: Can you have an experience you do not experience? That stopped me cold.

I knew social media was harmful. I knew I was the product being sold. But I did not fully understand that I am losing time. I am being systematically manipulated. The platforms use slot-machine psychology, variable rewards, and persuasive design. The author called it the “attention economy,” and we are the products, not the users. Their profits come from seizing our attention and selling it to advertisers. They track what I pay attention to, what makes me angry or afraid, and they feed me more of it. The author says we’re not even products anymore. We’re fuel like logs thrown on a fire and used up until there’s nothing left. They benefit from our resources, time, energy, and attention.

What struck me most is that the damage extends beyond the hour I lose on social media. It changes how I see the world. The book says social media distorts what we think matters, what threats we face, and how we see others. I have noticed I am more anxious now. More cynical. I catch myself assuming the worst about people, even friends whose politics I disagree with. The fear carries over to real life. And then I wonder: is this really me? Or has my attention been hijacked for so long that I’ve forgotten what I actually care about?

There is a line in the book about how attention cannot easily monitor itself. The only tool you have to see what is happening to your attention is your attention. If that is already captured, you may not notice anything is wrong. That was difficult to ignore. I have told myself for years that I am fine, that I am in control, and that scrolling is harmless. But what if that’s exactly what captured attention would say?

I also appreciated the honesty about our own role in this mess. The book says we give in willingly. Something in us wants distraction. I notice this when I sit down to write or draw. I feel restless. I often feel the urge to check my phone and deeply feel the need to do research on a topic. It feels like avoidance: avoiding solitude or being alone with myself. The distractions come from within, not outside.

There is also the political side. I see how outrage is rewarded. One scandal replaces the last, from the Epstein case to the US-Israel-Iran war. It feels difficult to have a grounded conversation. The book emphasizes this is part of the business model. I feel that deeply with steady exhaustion, yet I keep returning to it. I am tired of feeling like this. I am tired of feeling fractured. I would rather not look back in ten years and realize I spent my finite life scrolling through things I did not care about.

The chapter ends by saying political crises need political solutions, and we also need to understand our own role in this. I do not have a clear answer yet. But I can begin with admitting this: I am distracted and frustrated. I want to care about what matters to me. I want to want what I actually care about. And maybe by admitting it, it can be a perfect place to begin.

I Still Remember Him

I still remember him.

The first time I saw him, it was raining. I was sitting in the corner of a small, quiet cafe that smells of burnt beans and old wood. I was busy with my notebook, trying to finish a thought, when the bell above the door rang. He looked like he had wandered in by mistake. His hair was damp, sticking to his forehead in uneven clumps, and his jacket was slightly oversized and hung off his shoulders. He looked like he had not slept in days. He didn’t stand out. He felt out of place in that cafe. I noticed him, then returned to my notebook.

The shift happened months later on a Tuesday evening. We were walking toward a bus stop, and the wind was biting. I was complaining about a lost pen, and he stopped walking. He did not look at me. He peered at a little crack in the sidewalk where a weed was growing. He reached into his pocket, pulled out a piece of candy, and placed the wrapper carefully back. He said, “Most people look at the sky when they’re lost, but the answers are usually stuck to the bottom of your shoe.”

After that, I began to notice him more closely.

He notices things that other people ignore. He can tell when someone is lying by the way their hand shakes or how the barista hides chipped mugs at the back of the shelf. In conversation, he does not speak in a conventional way. He observes. He waits for the silence to become uncomfortable, then asks a question that lands where it is difficult to respond. He says things casually, like “Life is just a series of things we survive until we don’t,” while chewing on a lollipop.

He often has something in his hand. A lollipop, a toothpick, a plastic stick. He keeps his mouth occupied so he does not need to smile. When he thinks no one is looking, he rubs his temples and stares into space with an expression of concentration. He looks worn in those moments, an exhaustion that sleep does not resolve.

He once told me, “Don’t bother remembering the things that don’t want to be found.” I return to that moment often because of how still he was when he said it. His eyes were distant, yet he seemed aware of everything around him. It felt like he was giving me permission to stop looking for parts of him he had chosen to keep hidden.

When I think of him now, I remember the smell of sugar and cold rain. He made me pause because he was the first person I met who seemed to be living in the aftermath of something significant, yet he never asked for sympathy. He existed within it and occasionally pointed out something he thought was worth mentioning.

If someone met him briefly, they would miss the sharpness. They would see a messy, eccentric man who cannot keep his hair combed and seems slow to respond. They might think he is lazy. With time, it becomes clear that he is always aware of what is happening around him and that he often knows what you are about to say before you finish your sentence.

If I had to describe what makes him unique in one sentence, it would be this: he observes things that most people ignore and keeps facing them, even when it makes him uncomfortable.

A Word for Living Between Places

I came across The Dictionary of Obscure Sorrows several years ago. I found the Youtube channel first. I remember watching one video late at night. It was called Sonder: The Realization That Everyone Has A Story. The narrator’s voice was calm and unhurried. He described the word “sonder,” and I knew I had felt that feeling before but I couldn’t describe it. Here’s an excerpt taken from the book that describes sonder:

SONDER (the awareness that everyone has a story):

You are the main character. The protagonist. The star at the center of your own unfolding story. You’re surrounded by your supporting cast: friends and family hanging in your immediate orbit. Scattered a little further out, a network of acquaintances who drift in and out of contact over the years.

But there in the background, faint and out of focus, are the extras. The random passersby. Each living a life as vivid and complex as your own. They carry on invisibly around you, bearing the accumulated weight of their own ambitions, friends, routines, mistakes, worries, triumphs, and inherited craziness.

When your life moves on to the next scene, theirs flickers in place, wrapped in a cloud of backstory and inside jokes and characters strung together with countless other stories you’ll never be able to see. That you’ll never know exist. In which you might appear only once. As an extra sipping coffee in the background. As a blur of traffic passing on the highway. As a lighted window at dusk.

That word stayed in my mind and every time I’m out in the crowd watching strangers passing by, I would think of sonder.

Just like sonder, the rest of the words in that book describe small and specific experiences. They do not refer to objects or actions. They name moments that are easy to overlook because they do not demand attention. Reading them made me more aware of how much I move through life without naming what I feel.

Today’s prompt asks what I would want named after me. I thought about it for a while. I could not think of any place or object that felt right. Those things feel distant from how I experience my life day to day. And I do not relate to them in a meaningful way.

And I thought about the book. I would love to be an entry in such a book. A word feels closer because it can hold something that is lived but not always spoken. It can remain small and still carry meaning. It does not need visibility to exist.

I have been writing about living between places. I am Iban. I grew up in Sarawak, and I have lived in Kuala Lumpur for many years now. My life is here and I am raising my family here. I know the places, the roads, the routines, and the pace of this city.

When I return to the longhouse, I notice the difference. I’m fluent in Iban, but sometimes I pause to find the right word. The rhythm is familiar, but I am not fully inside it anymore. I am received with warmth, but there is also a sense that I have come from somewhere else.

That experience has remained with me, but it does not belong to a single location. It moves with me wherever I go. It shows up in small, ordinary moments like in the food I cook. In the stories I tell my children. In the way I think about the place where I come from.

Over time, I have come to see this as a connection that continues across distance. It is not always visible, but it is present. If I were to name that experience, I would keep it simple.

livselaka (n.)
the quiet state of living between places, where connection remains even when belonging is incomplete

Living Between Places

Most people don’t understand what it feels like to live between places. It is not exactly sadness. That is what I would want people to understand first. When they hear “between places,” they think of a wound, like a hole in the heart that never heals. That description does not fit. A “stretching” is more accurate.

I am Iban. My bones know the red earth of Sarawak. That is what my body recognizes first. But I have now lived in Kuala Lumpur longer than I ever lived there. I have a husband who grew up in Penampang, Sabah, and children who have only ever known this city as home. I pay the condo rent and fees. I navigate the highway to Puchong. I visit the Pasar Borneo in Seri Kembangan, where vendors sell dabai that has been flown in from Sarawak. My life is here but “here” does not feel like home in a complete way.

When I go back to the longhouse, I notice it in my cousins’ expressions. I am “the one from KL.” I speak the language, but sometimes the rhythm is slightly off. I have to pause to remember the right word for something I haven’t touched in years. I am welcomed, always, with warmth, food, and laughter, but there is a politeness to it. It’s a subtle sense that I am now a guest. My children, when they come with me, are treated with affection, but also with a gentle bewilderment. They are Iban, but they do not know how to be Iban in the way that is expected. I am no longer fully at home there either.

This leaves me in a scattered position. My identity is not a single point on a map. It is a thread that runs back and forth across the South China Sea. My children are the living proof of this stretch. Their identity extends across even more layers than mine. They are Iban-Kadazan by blood and suburban KL-ites by every lived experience. They eat nasi lemak for breakfast and request ayam pansoh or hinava for their birthday dinner. They speak English and Malay with a city accent and only understand a word or two of Iban or Kadazan. They are not disconnected from their heritage, I make sure of that, but they are also not rooted in it the way I once was. I see them working through their sense of being between places at school when asked where they’re “from.”

I used to feel guilty about this. As if I had not given them a single, stable foundation. I do not feel that way anymore. I have come to understand that geographical distance often reflects a connection, not a lack of it. I remain connected to my family through WhatsApp or Facebook.

Living between places means I am constantly translating language, meaning, belonging, and self. To my KL friends, I am the “exotic” one from Borneo, with the tattoos, living atop the trees, and the stories of the headhunter ancestors. To my family back home, I am the modern one, the city-dweller, and the one who left. Neither captures the full picture. The full truth is that I am both. People who have never left their home place might see this as a tragedy of loss. This misses something important. Staying in one place would have limited what I could carry with me.

I am not fully home in one place. The result is that I have made small homes in many. My identity is scattered like seeds. I am watching them grow, in my children and in the friendships I have built across this country.

It is a complicated way to live, but it is mine. It has made me capable of understanding something essential: that you can love a place deeply and still not belong to it entirely. That belonging can be a choice, a meal you cook, a story you tell, or a journey you make again and again. Many people do not understand what it feels like to live between places. But I do. And in that stretching I have found a form of wholeness I did not expect.

How Often Do I Say No?

Daily writing prompt

How often do you say “no” to things that would interfere with your goals?

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According to Oliver Burkeman, the average human lifespan is about 4,000 weeks. It sounds like a large number at first glance, but as I reflect, it starts to feel limited. I will not have time to do everything I want. Every “yes” comes at the expense of something else. The real issue is how often I fail to say no. I admit I don’t say no as often as I should.

I notice these patterns in small moments. For example, I sit at my computer with a task open in front of me. The work is clear and I know what I need to achieve. After a while, I reach for my phone without thinking. I open Instagram and start doomscrolling cat videos. A few minutes pass and sometimes it stretches to half an hour. When I finally look at the clock on the corner of my screen, I feel a small shock. Nothing important happened, but time is gone. This kind of “yes” feels harmless at the time and it happens more often than I realize. Over time, it detracts from the things I claim to care about.

When I was younger, I said yes more easily. I followed whatever felt more interesting at the time and left things unfinished. These were not always big decisions. Sometimes it was something small, like wanting to revise for an upcoming exam but I ended up reading a magazine instead. Repeated often enough, they eventually shaped how I used my time. But back then, I did not recognize them as choices.

Part of the difficulty is how easily my attention shifts. Technology makes distraction easy. But the pull is not only external. There is also an internal urge to avoid discomfort because it is easier to reach for something light than to stay with something that requires effort.

For a long time, I tried to do too many things at once. I thought being efficient meant I could fit more into my time. Instead, I felt stretched thin. I became exhausted, and over time, I felt anxious. I was trying to move everything forward without accepting that my time and energy are limited. It’s a paradox: that pattern created more pressure and not less.

When things didn’t work, I felt frustrated. That frustration sometimes turned into resentment. I blamed my lack of time on external things like my responsibilities, my family, and the situation around me. However, that was not the full picture. Things changed when I began to accept my limits more honestly. I can only do so much; moreover, most of what I do will not be significant on a larger scale.

That realization changed how I use my time. I started to value smaller, ordinary things more: cooking for my family, taking care of the home, and being present in simple moments. No matter how mundane these things are, they are part of my life. It also clarified what matters to me.

When my priorities are unclear, everything starts to feel urgent. It becomes harder to say no because everything feels important. When I know what I want to focus on, it is easier to step away from what does not support it. I still do not say no as often as I should but I notice it more now. I see it in the small decisions that do not seem important at first but if I pause, I can see where they lead.

I Stay a Little Longer

I am on a morning train in Japan, traveling from Tokyo to Kyoto without any hurry to get there. The shinkansen is quiet. There are empty seats on both sides of the aisle. I am seated by the window on the left. The glass is slightly blurred, with thin streaks of dried rain. The air conditioning hums overhead. I take out my tablet and try to read, but I am not really following the words. The train moves quickly past factories, houses, schools, and open fields.

Mount Fuji appears in the distance. Clouds cover parts of it, but the top is still visible, white against a pale blue sky. At its base, the forest is dark and still. We pass rows of apartments. Laundry hangs outside, moving gently in the morning air. An ojisan adjusts his plants on a balcony. A woman walks slowly with a toddler, a shopping bag in her hand. Inside, a staff member pushes a cart down the aisle. The smell of food lingers faintly, a mix of sweet and savory. I reach into my bag for my notebook and pen. I pause and swallow.

I tend to stay with these small scenes longer than I need to. The man on the balcony. The woman and her child. The laundry moving in the same direction. I do not know them, but my mind fills in details without effort. Who they might be. What their days look like. How their lives move within these spaces I only pass through. This has been true for as long as I can remember.

People sometimes say I have a good memory. I can recall certain moments from a distant past with more detail than expected. I have always treated it as ordinary, something I do not pay much attention to. But it is not only memory. When I pass places I have never been before, I find myself imagining the lives inside them. A row of houses is no longer just a row of houses. It becomes a set of possible lives, each one carrying its routines and concerns and small moments no one else sees.

I do not do this intentionally. It happens without effort. The same way I noticed the man moving his plants, or the way the laundry shifts in the wind. I do not stop to question it. I stay with what is in front of me a little longer than I need to.

Because of this, I remember more than I expect to. Not everything. Just certain details that remain clear. A place. A movement. Something small that stays when I return to it later.

The train continues forward. Outside, the scenery changes without pause. Inside, I sit by the window, watching, and then writing it down before it fades.

The Heat Stayed

Daily writing prompt

What is your favorite type of weather?

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I’m not very good at cooking.

I usually keep my meals simple. I prepare food that is easy and does not need a lot of time or attention. Cooking has never been something I enjoy. I find the act tiresome. The heat, the standing, and the continual movement in a hot kitchen. It wears me out quickly.

But today was different. I decided to prepare something special for the family. It was more than just a meal this time, a little more considered. I took my time, slicing the vegetables: eggplant, okra, and long beans. I observed the knife’s path, the way it transformed the surfaces as it went. Usually, I don’t focus on such details. Today I did.

The kitchen was hot. The heat was not only coming from the stove but also from the long, hot day. The sun was dazzling. The air felt still. As I stirred the pot, I could feel the heat descended on my skin and stay there. It made me feel sluggish.

I dislike this weather. If I could, I would always pick something cooler. Rain or a cloudy afternoon with gentle light and lighter air. My body moves more effortlessly on such days. Less clutter in my head.

Today was not one of those days. It was bright and sunny outside, and I was preparing something spicy in a warm kitchen. The combination felt strange. The heat from the stove, the heat from the weather, and the heat from the food layered on top of each other. I stirred the curry and watched it thicken. The aroma and the warmth mixed as they spread through the room.

The heat persisted when I finally sat down to eat. In the air, on my skin, and in my food. The curry was delicious. A little spicy, but not too much. The veggies kept their form. The broth wasn’t overly thick.

I took my time eating. The spiciness stayed on my tongue. The warmth remained in my chest. Outside, the light had not softened yet.

How the Church Shaped the Way I Think

Daily writing prompt

Who was your most influential teacher? Why?

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If I were to answer this in the usual manner, I would probably say a teacher from school or someone who left a lasting impression on me. But when I think about influence more deeply, the answer does not point to a single person but to an organization. The church. The church was the most important teacher in my life.

For many years, the church shaped how I saw the world and my place in it. It influenced how I interpreted right and wrong, how I made choices, and how I approached questions about life. Because it was a part of my everyday life, I didn’t always notice how it influenced me. It felt normal, like a framework I could rely on.

That structure eventually became the way through which I processed most things. I learned to read selectively and only chose what aligned with the church’s values. I learned to ask questions carefully because some questions and topics are off-limits or could raise suspicions about my spiritual health. There was a limit to my curiosity, even if I didn’t always see it. But I didn’t think of this as a problem at the time. I considered it a sign of being responsible and disciplined. It also gave me a sense of direction and how to deal with uncertainty.

However, the church’s influence didn’t go away after I left. If anything, it made that influence more clear. Without it as my main point of reference, I started to see how much my outlook had changed over the years. Some reactions and patterns of thinking didn’t come from nowhere. They had been formed slowly and consistently over time.

This awareness grew over time and it showed up in little things. For example, when I read something and didn’t feel the urge to assess it against a set of beliefs. Another example is when I let a question remain open without feeling like I had to address it right away. What I noticed most was recognizing a familiar thinking pattern and stopping before going further.

Recently, I have been reading Oliver Burkeman’s Four Thousand Weeks. The book does not present entirely new ideas, but it changed how I relate to what I had learned before. The idea that time is finite and not everything can be pursued has impacted how I see my life. It does not give me a new set of rules to follow. Instead, it reminds me that my time is limited and that I cannot do everything, no matter how much I want to.

Now, when I think about influence, it no longer refers to a single person or idea. It feels more like layers that have been added over time. Being in church for a long time shaped some of the ways I thought. Now, I question them and choose which ones still make sense to me. They still affect how I think, but I am more aware of them than I used to be.

Learning to Think for Myself

I used to think that this question would have a straightforward answer. If I were to answer directly without much thought, I would probably say, “Read more, write more, and get more exercise.” These pursuits are easily slotted into a daily routine. However, my answer doesn’t seem as solid lately.

What I wish I could do more every day is to live without that continual feeling of pressure in the background. There is always this subtle feeling that I should be accomplishing more, learning faster, doing things right, or staying within particular boundaries that I didn’t set for myself.

I began to notice how that pressure changed the way I think. For years, the teachings and expectations of the church shaped the way I thought. I read selectively and questioned things carefully. My curiosity came with hesitation, as though there were boundaries I wasn’t meant to cross. I didn’t see it as pressure back then. I thought I was just being responsible and doing the right thing to safeguard my faith.

Things are clearer to me now that I’m no longer coming to church. However, the difference is very subtle and happens in little things. When I pick up a book, I don’t feel the need to examine if it aligns with my Christian values. I can entertain an idea without immediately judging its worth. I can linger in uncertainty, not feeling the pressure to have an answer on the spot.

I see it in my reading and writing. I can tell since my thoughts move more slowly and aren’t as occupied. I also have a softness that I didn’t have previously. I don’t condemn myself as quickly as I used to. I feel less inclined to turn every mistake into something that needs to be fixed right away. I can accept my flaws without feeling like I’ve failed.

The process is still new. I’m still in the early stages. There are times when I go back into old habits, like when I start to think in ways that I’ve been taught in church for years. But unlike before, now I have the awareness and I can stop the thought or pattern before it escalates even further. And with time, I believe I can unlearn the patterns that were shaped during those years in the church.

This ability to think and live with a sense of ownership is what I desire more of every day. I want to read without guilt. I want to ask questions without being afraid. I want to make decisions based on understanding rather than obligation. But I can’t force it into a schedule or keep track of it all the time. From the outside, it appears unproductive because it doesn’t always show results right away. However, it changes the texture of my day because the changes are internal. It gives me a sense of stability. It also gives me a peaceful mind because I don’t have to prove or justify anything.

And in that peace, I notice that I am more present in what I am already doing, like cooking, reading, writing, or being with my family, without feeling the need to be somewhere else. Like I said, the change is internal and happens slowly. Some days I notice it more than others. Some days I lose it and have to find my way back. But when it’s there, even briefly, the day feels a lot different.