We climbed to church carrying the things for Sunday school and I talked the whole first part of the path, then had to pretend I was admiring the view because my breath was gone. The children had run ahead without difficulty, naturally. I could feel my calves pulling at each steep bit and the bag strap was making one shoulder much higher than the other. Once we reached the top, the air felt cool against my damp back and I wanted to stand there longer before going inside. During the first hymn my voice was not ready for a long line at all. By the second it had opened properly. Next time someone else can carry the crayons, since they have so much energy.

One tuition child brought me a drawing of our lesson, with me much taller than the blackboard and all the children looking very obedient. Such fiction! She had put the paper inside her book so it would not fold, and I was touched before she even showed it fully. I keep thinking about the entrance result when people ask what I am doing now, as if this whole year has only that one answer. Today somebody had spent her evening drawing my big teacher head. Mother wanted to show it to a visitor and I said no, then quietly put it where the visitor could see. The child also gave me enormous earrings. Apparently I am fashionable in her version.

In the drama I am watching, everyone understands the hero's silence as something deep, but if the choir boy is quiet on our walk I have to do all the interpreting myself. Yesterday he asked whether I had eaten. It can mean concern or simply that there was nothing else to say, and I have considered both far too thoroughly for one question. I tried imagining what I would actually want him to ask, without background music and rain like on television. Nothing very grand, only whether I would like to talk a little longer. Then I realised I could ask that also. I have not decided to do it. Knowing the sentence and saying the sentence are two different subjects na.