This morning, prayers came after reminders, a quiet duty before breakfast. The clock ticked gently as I prepared tissue and lozenges, wiped my shoes from a stranger’s spit, and faced small scoldings about keeping the floor clean. In the lift, the door closed and opened again — a forgotten phone, a quick return, a reunion.

At the course, a slip of scanning the wrong code turned into laughter from the teacher, lightening the mood. Messages came, calling me “dear friend,” with playful images of pandas eating bamboo. Outside, the rain guided us through Tai Seng, a wrong level, then the right one, registration and lecture, lunch and lessons that stretched to evening.

Tests came with mixed results — a mother scoring steady, a daughter faltering more. Yet together, we passed. Practical hands washed, choices made, laughter heard, but still the day carried us forward.

Beyond the classroom, family news pressed close: a grandfather in hospital, a grandmother’s eyes dimming, an aunt stepping in. Quiet threads of worry wove themselves into the hours.

Returning home, newspaper and chrysanthemum tea in hand, nausea rose and small mistakes lingered — the heater left on, the water unpoured. Yet in the quiet of the toilet, memory returned: the girl who once wrote diaries in Pasir Ris Crest, smiling at the thought of how those pages became the beginning of an author’s life.