I heard my own voice sound tired on the phone and pretended I hadn’t noticed

Dear Delyara, It was only a normal call. A practical one. But halfway through I heard it — that flatness that arrives when I have been useful for too long and there is no softness left in the tone. The other person probably didn’t hear much. I did. That is one of the oddest parts of getting older. You begin recognising your own strain in tiny places. In your mouth. In your breathing. In the way you answer a simple question as if it has arrived in the wrong decade of your patience. I finished the call. Then I sat in silence for a minute longer than necessary.