9pm and on. Pondering shapes of stories and irregular characters and the weirdness in typesetting and the shadows cast by burnt-down candles. And weather. A dark person moving behind curtains on the other side of the road. A car alert going off for a few moments, silenced fast enough before being able to notice details. Ephemeral thoughts in the emptiness of late busses.
(Am Wegesrand: Weiches Laub unter den Sohlen und um die Schuhe. Kurz verharren. Auf der Terrasse des Abrisshauses feiern Nachbarn aus jenem Viertel, sitzen an einen rostigen Grill und trinken Bier aus Dosen. Baustellenbeschilderung, zerbrochene Fenster, Ausfallstraßen. Manche Städte haben spürbareres Grau als andere.)
(Somewhere along the way. Moving south and it gradually gets colder. Distance in everything, the feeling of being surrounded by unfamiliar places in undescribed territories. The sound of engines and tires. Moving on, stopping by then and now to let the soul catch up.)
4pm and on. Discomfort in miscommunication. Rolling back in an attempt to figure out where things got off track. Definitely not pleased at all, wondering which part of social skills it might take to fix what broke. Still: Apprentice in the art of wrapping difficult insights in appealing ways.
4pm and on. Face in the sun. Head in invisible clouds, or vice versa. Still ticking with the beat of the latest tasks, still hard to slow down. Hours later, different school kids make their way home through the office backyards, jackets carelessly wrapped around hips, ice cream cones in hands, way too bulky, heavy bags shouldered as good as somewhat possible. Office dwellers afternoon rituals: Loading dishwashers, changing clothes, shoving expensive bicycles down narrow staircases. Always in the midst of moving on.
4pm and on. Running through calls in tight sequence piles up artifacts that somehow require documentation and attention. Quietly shouting at ones on poor handwriting style so postprocessing all these roughly collected notes becomes an immediate task in order to not lose important nuances. Staring at the cameras as if to make it embarrassed but failing at it. Pondering plays on words and how they fail in other languages all too often. System fans running louder again. Shadows in the backyard. The sun stayed. The day didn't.
4pm again, almost. Relocating between offices. Or places that could just be used as offices. Depending on ones point of view, or on ones temporary mood. Not managing to find the right music, for the moment. Or the right speed. Still halfway into everything. And still a bit out in the sun.
4pm and on. Messing up time formats and zones. Once again. Some issues are a nasty re-occurring source of fun, much as pondering what to do when entering or leaving DST twice a year anew - both trivial and yet not at all. On the other side of the backyard, people are leaving office early today. Some seem to have spent money on new air conditioners. Everyone else just resorted to sweating and coping. As far as possible.