5th February 2011

It is six on a Saturday and I am the person awake in this house. The heating has not come on yet as I walk into the kitchen. It is mostly dark except for the light, above the cooker because Mum always leaves this light on because she thinks a dark kitchen is depressing. I think Mum is right a dark kitchen is depressing.

I am sitting here with a piece of toast that has a lot of butter on it and a cup of tea. This cup of tea is still too hot for me to drink, and I do not care because I feel like I own the morning. It is like the morning was left here for me and nobody else knows that the morning is here. I am happy that I get to enjoy the Saturday morning by myself.

I like that I get to have the morning to myself it is a feeling, as this is a time of day and I am glad that I am awake to see it. I will just sit here and enjoy my toast and tea and the quiet morning.

I run on Saturdays. I do not run far I do not run fast I just do this loop through the park. Back that takes about twenty-five minutes if I do not stop to look at things, which I usually do. There is a point where the path goes between two rows of trees and if the light is right you can see your breath and the steam rising off the grass at the time and the whole thing looks like the world is still deciding whether to wake up properly. The geese on the pond are always awake before me, which I find both impressive and judgemental. One of the geese hissed at me week and I hissed back at the goose. The geese. I have an understanding now.

I think best when nobody needs me. I know that is a thing to notice about myself at seventeen. There it is. When the house is asleep and the phone has not started and nobody is asking me what the plan is or whether I have remembered the thing or could I just quickly do that thing my brain gets quiet enough to actually hear itself. It is like the difference, between trying to listen to music in a room and listening to music alone with headphones. The music is the same. You hear different parts of the music.

During the week I am always on. At school I am the one who knows the schedule, who has the pen, who remembers that the meeting room is booked and the homework is due and the permission slip needs signing. I am the one Mrs Danvers asks to collect the textbooks because she knows I will count the textbooks properly. I'm the one Mae texts when she can't find the classroom because she's wandered off again, physically or mentally, both happen with equal frequency. At home I'm the one who notices when the dishwasher needs emptying or when Dad's in a mood or when Mum's pretending she's fine when she's clearly been on the phone to Auntie Rose again about something that isn't really about kitchens.

I don't mind it. That's the thing. I like being useful. I like the way people relax when I walk into a room because they know someone competent has arrived and they can stop pretending they've got it handled. Is that weird? Is that a good quality or a warning sign? Mae says I have "eldest daughter energy" even though I'm an only child, which is both accurate and slightly concerning. She says it like a compliment. Sometimes I hear it like a diagnosis.

But Saturday mornings are mine. The toast is mine. The run is mine. The twenty-five minutes of cold air and tree-breath and geese-related conflict and nobody asking me for anything, that's mine. Nobody is watching me be anything. I'm just here, being a person who runs slowly and eats too much butter and notices the steam on the grass. No performance. No audience. Just me and the morning, keeping each other company.

I wonder if I'll always have this. A time in the day that belongs to me before it belongs to anyone else. A window between sleeping and being needed where I can think thoughts that aren't to-do lists. I hope so. I'm going to hold onto Saturday mornings like a policy. A personal rule that doesn't need negotiating or justifying or explaining to anyone. The kind of thing you protect not because it's productive but because without it you start to forget what your own thoughts sound like when they're not answering someone else's question.

I can hear the pipes making a clanking noise. It sounds like the house is waking up and stretching after a time of sleeping. The house is waking up. It is making a lot of noise. My dad will be getting up in twenty minutes. He will come downstairs wearing the jumper he wore yesterday. My dad will make the joke that he always makes. He will say that he needs a cup of coffee before he can actually make himself a cup of coffee. My dad always makes this joke.

My mum will be up in forty minutes. She will ask if I have run already. I will say yes. My mum will say " girl" even though I am seventeen. The house is still waking up. I like it when my mum says " girl". My mum says this to me even though I am seventeen and I should be beyond this stage. I still like it when my mum says " girl”, to me. By then the morning will have shifted from mine to ours, which is also fine - just different.

Going to lace up and go before the world wakes up and wants things from me. The geese are waiting or hissing. Same thing.