The serenity and contentment within me from my time in Paros, Greece for my summer holiday has now left me completely. That life that I dream of living — one where I only need to watch the sun set, with a journal and a cigar in hand — temporarily vanished.

The same corridor, the same forced smile to the receptionist, the same tug of heaviness in my chest. The air smells of my office having just been cleaned, and the first whirring of the air conditioner. The light overhead is too white, too harsh.