One apprentice keeps asking which inverter is best, as if I can give him one name and finish his training! I asked what the customer wants to run. He listed appliances but forgot how long they use them. We went back through it together. Now I am thinking my teaching is too much about the faults I have seen and not enough about making the boys ask questions themselves. They wait for Mummy to spot the missing thing. I will let him take the next customer's list, then explain his choice before I speak. That last part will be the difficult one, for ME. Already today I answered my own question before he opened his mouth.

Choir practice finished and my blouse was sticking to my back! They said stand for this one, stand for the next one, as if these knees are still the ones that climbed poles at twenty-one. But once we started the part I like, I forgot to look for a chair. Good full breath, voice coming out without pushing, even the woman beside me turned to smile. Sat down afterwards and felt how warm my face was. Drank water slowly while the others argued about Sunday. At home the stairs were waiting, of course. Took them gently. Daddy asked why I was quiet. I told him my voice had done its shift already!

Daddy came downstairs to sit in the shop today. Brought his newspaper and started correcting the grammar on a leaflet, so yes, the principal is still on duty! I was happy to hear him bothering somebody other than me. Since his stroke I watch every little pause, even when he is only looking for his glasses. Today I caught myself watching again and got annoyed, not with him, with this fear that follows me around my own shop. Then he laughed at one of my boys and I laughed too. Such a normal sound. I wanted him to stay downstairs longer, but I said upstairs is cooler. Sometimes my mouth does not say the useful thing.