We will, no doubt, all have family and friends in our circle who have a reputation for being late. An old priest used to refer to my mother as “the late Mrs Defoe” and she is still alive 40 years later!

This post is not about being late in the sense of not being where you perhaps ought to be on time. This post is about a sense of judgement I feel is placed upon me when on my return from work on an evening, my wife will sometimes say “You’re Late”

I immediately feel judged because, in trying to build a place of calm in my life, I have, in recent years, kept work at work and home at home. For me, the dividing line in terms of the actual time that work ends and home starts is not the issue, it is the separation of the two which helps me to manage my life.

I recognise, less easily, the truth of my wife that she is concerned for my well being in terms of me eating late after being out at work for what seems to her an excessive amount of time.

So, I have asked her to express that concern differently because although her comments come from a place of love, in my attempt to be in the world, I need to avoid a sense of hearing her love as a judgement.

My next blog will be: Visiting a friend

William Defoe