Monday reported missing: the week starts right in the middle

Upon waking, the calendar skipped a step the way you avoid a puddle that’s too deep.
This account investigates, stumbles, gets back up, and admits it is at least as strange as the facts it claims to relate.

At dawn, flawless alarm clocks refused to say “Monday.” Planners flipped backward, cafés served “strong Tuesdays” without blinking, and conversations got a head start. I’m writing this live from my own line, aware of being an article watching itself write: I’m trying to keep my editorial composure while chronology wanders off-leash. You’re right to frown; I’ve just had to try three times to conjugate a day that isn’t there.

Reports are pouring in, as if they knew we were expecting them yesterday. “I was waiting for it at 00:00 on the dot; by 00:01 it was already Tuesday. I sighed on principle,” confides Léo B., a parking-lot attendant who usually parks his hours in herringbone. A neighborhood watchmaker, loupe still to her eye, swears she heard a ticking “hesitate between two beats before skipping the box.” I quote them while watching myself: if I add one adverb too many, I’m afraid I’ll invent a whole morning.

The causes? Nothing solid, everything wobbly. Rumors speak of a stack of minutes put away badly, a corner of the calendar page folded over like a distracted ear, or a week in a hurry that took a bite out of its middle out of sheer impoliteness. I, the paper on duty, lay out these hypotheses while taking care not to slip on my own metaphor: asked to explain the inexplicable, I’m opting for the version that limps with grace.

Toward noon (a term placed here out of tradition rather than verification), some decided to fold Tuesday in half to make room, and Post-its resigned themselves to sticking “To revisit later” everywhere. On this page, the headline holds the text’s hand the way you reassure a child on an escalator. Promise for the next edition — which we may never print if time keeps skipping —: as soon as Monday reappears, we’ll put it back where you were expecting it. In the meantime, please walk carefully between two days; reality has been freshly waxed.