I washed the bathroom sink today and put handknits in to soak. And I took out the kitchen trash.

There are lots of things I didn’t do. Every floor in the house needs cleaning. (Periodically I kick over the cat’s water dish and have to wipe it up, but short of relocating Corey’s bowl all over the apartment, I don’t think that’s my best bet.) The fridge needs sorting and Mount Laundry threatens us with avalanches while we sleep.

But all those things needed doing yesterday and I had no clean wool socks, my kitchen trash can only stayed closed because it had a bag of groceries perched on it (oh, I put those away, too), and my bathroom sink looked like a prop from a 1980s movie set in a New York City bus terminal.

Honestly, these were such minor things to feel good about getting done, but I got them done for the first time in a while. And I could choose to feel guilty about the state of the apartment and stress about how much work we need to do before anyone can next stop by (no one has stopped by in 16 months). Or I could take the win and recognize that I looked at several things that needed doing and actually just did them.

I don’t fool myself into thinking this will be an everyday occurrence. Honestly, pretty much any workday barely sees me doing more than basic self-care. But even if I could do a couple things every weekend (clear the coffee table or dust away the cobwebs by the window), it would be a step toward righting the ship.

But for today, I’ll admire my mostly empty trash can and go hang up the socks that should now be clean in my shiny bathroom sink. After all, every sunrise starts with a single ray of light.