I woke up this morning on a strange bed in a strange room in a house I didn’t recognize, and didn’t know what day it was.

At my age, this is not actually an unusual feeling, mind you, but this time it was real, because I am on vacation at the beach. And I am with family, with three and a half days to go of never being entirely alone. This used to be normal, I remind myself. Also, as I found out after a decent interval, it’s Wednesday, Wednesday of a week that goes from Saturday afternoon to Saturday morning.

The six-year-old has gotten over the first horrid wash of homesickness and is now itchy. The adult child is trying to do remote work, because they just started a part time job, and so in the back of their head they have emails, newsletters, and text messages washing around like plastic goldfish. The son-in-law is speaking patiently in his low, quiet voice that I can never quite hear. And it is Wednesday.

We took the child out to the beach and looked at waves, went for the obligatory diner-style breakfast, and walked back to the house slowly and with dignity. Soon, we are all going out on a so-called “trolley” tour of the historic shore town we go to every year. We had a conversation with an elderly lady who complimented the grandchild on the fact that he didn’t barrel into her. There are many more tasks to undertake. Meanwhile, I have realized that another day began without my quite being able to catch up to it, as if everyone had loaded themselves into a car and driven off with me running after it, because here it is already Wednesday, and I didn’t notice.

I am sitting in the dining room of the vacation rental, with sunlight falling in stripes to my left and painters working outside, and everyone has gone away. Birds are screeching outside. I hear a ladder banging against the wall of the house. I will spend a few moments noticing who I am and where I am, and then I will be ready to face a few more days of this, whatever it is, wherever I am, whatever day of the week this is.