Author: Ellen Bell

Does anyone Spring Clean anymore? It always makes me think of Mole in Wind in the Willows and the distemper on his nose and fur. I want to do it. I want to do it because neatening, cleaning, sorting out makes me calm. As does the shedding, the shedding of stuff, of clutter that weighs me down with it’s unlooked-at, unresolved unnecessary-ness. There is so much I don’t need. Yesterday two of my little wooden tool drawers got stuck. I joggled and jiggled them, shouting and hollering in frustration. It just needs dealing with, sorting out, neatening. That’s all. It’s time really. Well, and a decision to give it time. And I will. Saturday, God willing. Just for the peace it will give me. And I’ve invested in Muji things, you know, those eco-friendly plastic-style trays and boxes – momentarily they rest in the bottom of my cupboard crying out to be used.

There was a house alarm going off while I walked this morning. It was the kind of high keening noise that only dogs usually hear and there was a flashing green light. Were they all asleep? What is one to do in such a situation? Call the police?

Claudia Hammond has been hosting a repeat show on Radio 4 Extra called Team Spirit. She talks about how team-work functions in various situations. In one she spoke to the Antarctica team but it wasn’t their conversation that interested me so much but something she said in passing about how the scientists and facilitators out there cope with the extremes of cold, solitude and lack of light. She said something about how enduring such things increased, or fed, their sense of self. They were, in effect, made proud by it. It’s such a tenuous thing. And our sanity is closely intertwined with it. Every day is a balancing act.

Oh, and have I told you how the adaptation of Anne Tyler’s Back When We Were Grown-ups is such a source of pleasure? And it ends tomorrow. And then the storm is due.

The woman with the bag for life walked passed me again this morning, her head down, no eye contact. I wish her well. Good morning, I say in my head as we pass, may it be a peaceful one.

Sometimes when I forget it comes. It’s a letting go of sorts. And now, there, she has responded. It doesn’t set my life on fire what she says but it is something, she has thought of me. A little. I am wound up today, it started on waking. My back is a taut band. I try to walk it out but thoughts keep assailing me bringing forward fears of future things that I cannot, as yet, resolve. At least I know it. I know it well. And I need to get on with work. I have much to do. I like that but the fear of failure is, at times, intense. He is kind, he tries to let me down gently. He’s forgetting too. Words mostly. We laugh more about it now, then we did. All becomes easier, in the end. We’ve opted for a no frills one, a cremation and that’s it. I prefer it. All that fuss when all you want to do is crawl away and hide. Family may be disappointed but heigh ho. It’s our deaths, eh?

No rain when I walked and no one was about. I began the application. I tried to be open, honest, genuine. I want it. But know that I need to do it and then forget it. Let it go, like a breath. Do you best then exhale. Simple.

My return to coffee is a real pleasure once more. The little pot works like a dream. Just one. Just one cup. Rich and dark. The kitchen exudes with the aroma of it. Lovely. Can I thank you for that? And our full fridge. I am blessed.

There is a couple ahead of me. It is three-thirty am. They are young, possibly students. He is in long shorts, she wears a mohair jumper, off the shoulders, and a shiny silver belt in her jeans. She is swaying, leaning into him. He steers her along the pavement. I am closer now. I can hear his voice. Soft at first, then more insistent. What’s six plus three? he asks her. She mumbles something but I can’t hear. Six plus three, he says louder and more insistent, come on, what’s six plus three. Is it some kind of game or a mental breathalyser test? It’s nine, he says, exasperated. Nine.

She was coming out of the garage, her customary plastic bag for life now full. She must’ve seen my approach, though she didn’t acknowledge it, for she hesitated and crossed the road. She stayed on the other side of the road, walking in that roll of hers, slowly. I turned to look back at her and she dropped her head. Does she talk to the man in the garage? This town seems to be a harbour for such introverts. All moods, all personas, however idiosyncratic are, if not welcome, tolerated and let be. I like that. May they continue to feel safe. Yesterday I walked past the shelter and there was a man, sitting erect on the bench smoking. Was he the ‘jackass’ of a few days ago, who said ‘woman’ to the girl who claimed to be IRA? He had a thick, black moustache and I could smell the sweat of him. I nodded my head in greeting, a half-hearted attempt at implying all was perfectly tickety-boo. He didn’t react, merely stared at me, his eyes cold and hard. I felt a frisson of fear. And walked on, my step quickening.

Standing in the queue in the post office waiting to renew my passport (and nervous about the inevitable taking of the awful photograph with me looking a hundred and ninety) I saw a young man in one of those woolen Outer Mongolian hats with stripes, toggles that hang down from the sides and topped with a bobble. He’d not joined the queue but gone straight to one of the cashiers’ booths and asked for some kind of a form. I left it. But then he must’ve picked something up for he turned and gestured that I should take his place. It’s OK, I mouthed. (The photo, as I’d expected, was awful. Happy with that one? asked the assistant. No, I said, rather too brusquely. I had to go with the second one which was equally bad. I should’ve put some make-up on. Heigh ho.)

The milkman went past as I turned for home. His van was careering. It’s a comfort though. There is something so normal about the milk delivery. Now to work. Another application. I will do my best. Get it down. Tell the truth. No fudge. No obfuscation. It will do. It will do.

I am a mess of indecision. Should I walk with music or not? I decided to do so and walked home to the lush, chocolate-y tones of Van Morrison and John Lee Hooker singing Get the Healing Done. ‘We’re going to get the healing done. Till you’re satisfied with your life. Till you’re living in the light…Till you find your original face…’ Gorgeous. I love to walk with shuffle on. Anything could come on. Norwegian lessons, Proust, Christmas carols, whatever. I let it choose. I should live more like this. I always trust it is the right thing for me to hear – why not live the same way?

She talked of striking a pose like Superwoman. A TED lecture. She was good. It was something to do with aping animals when they are scared or under threat and making the body big. So arms akimbo and legs astride and think of that blue leotard, red tights and gold boots – that’s it. Apparently it stimulates brave, go-getting hormones in the body. It fools it. Go on, she said, fake it. And keep faking it. And soon, she said, you will belong.

‘She felt almost afloat with the sense of possibility.’ I was listening to an audio reading on the radio this morning of Back When We Were Grown Ups by Anne Tyler and I scribbled down this quote. I am entranced by the book and by her writing. I identify so much with Rebecca the main protagonist. She is searching, lost, and going back to the past to find her way back. I think. I’ve yet to get to the end. I too feel that afloat-ness with possibility but usually when I am out of my life, travelling.

I haven’t a cat in hell’s chance of getting it. And I feel wobbled by my uncertainty – should I still put in an application that is so wanting? But I tell myself it is an exercise, an exercise in getting myself onto paper, in seeing what is possible and what might come back. In the end it may just bring me back, to here to what I have here, my writing, my making, my loving, my being, my thinking, my walking, my hoping. Would that be so bad?

What is it I am frightened of? I mine the depths of my psyche as I walk. It is simply fear of being found wanting? I’ve always had to battle through my fear when writing any application. That struggle of how to put oneself across on paper, in a few lines, enough to say give me a chance, I can do that. And the years haven’t helped, if anything they have made me more fearful. I could just not do it. I could go back to bed, take another walk, go for a coffee, read, sew, or just sit and stare. But I cannot. I must face this. Move into it. Do it. And the other one. I have to try. Even if the chances of anything coming of it are so slim. I need help. I need help to do it well.

The morning, so far, bodes well. A lovely pastel  blue sky. There was an east wind as I walked but still it looks to be set fine. We sat on our bench yesterday afternoon. How I love the sun on my face. Glorious. Town was noisy this morning. All sorts of shouting and clamour coming from outside the Why Not? and Pier Pressure clubs. The seagulls,equally noisy, glide above the din. What do they make of it? Taxi cabs weave and glide along the streets, a busy hour for them.

Make a start and complete it by tomorrow. An open letter, outlining my skill and celebrating the diversity of my career to date. Five hundred words, two-fifty by the time we have to go to the supermarket and then another two-fifty when I return. I’m dog-tired again. A cup of tea then down to it. I will feel better when it’s faced, head-on. I promise.

I’ve been self-indulgent. Discontent is but an ego-trip, a presupposing of something better. And yet, this is where I am, here now in this mid-Welsh town watching the sun come up through the window of my small studio. I am so blessed. Forget myself and remember the wonder. It is possible to feel it. I know this because I am beginning to remember. Surely the trick is to celebrate, hugs one’s life to one’s chest and be thankful. Must I go on? Is it clear yet? I apologised. And yet, when I got in their to wake him and say my piece, or should I say peace, there was a yellow post-it note on his chest of drawers. He’d written a series of questions about my unhappiness, was it to do with his being ill etc. It was so tender, so generous. How like him. I adore you, he said last night.

I think I need to explore the application process, go for things and see it is an exercise in writing. How to get myself across. But all the while being present, alert to what is – the sun, the sea, safe walks and a loving husband.

A gentle day today. A grounding day. I was still in Copenhagen this time last week. Think of that. Time flies.

A programme I listened to last week about the Parisian bouquinistes (itinerant book sellers) still plays around in my head, particularly something one of them, a woman, said. I sell books, she said with that French savoir-faire, and I’m free.

All that is to be mine will come to me. I will not mourn the rest but be thankful.

I could hear them from quite a distance away. The morning air was mild and warm with no wind and voices tend to carry, so much so that as I walk the Prom I can’t always tell the direction. They weren’t shouting but talking loudly. They pronounced, there was no conversation, no melding of subject, no real interaction. I’m IRA, announced a female voice. I’m IRA, she repeated in a soft, definitely Northern Irish twang. I was getting closer now. They were in the shelter on the Prom. Normally there are two or three men sleeping there when I walk past. This time they were wide awake. I didn’t see the girl, she was shielded from my view from a man in what looked like off-white pyjamas, standing akimbo. Jackass, said the same woman’s voice. You’re a jackass. Then a man’s voice. Woman, he said in what sounded like an Eastern European brogue.

The students have gone and the people I see milling around are all strangers, mostly men. I don’t feel as safe, as cocooned. There were 10 or 12 mobile-home-cum-caravans parked up down by the harbour. I wondered whether I should say anything to him about it. It will make him angry, I thought. I took the chance, and it did. I suppose if I were them I’d like to sleep by the sea too. It feels different though with all those vehicles. Crammed-in, the spaciousness stolen.

We went to sit in the sun on North Road. I sat and waited for him while he drove off to find a parking place. I watched two men below mowing and neatening up the bowling green. He mowed the grass in diagonals. Phew, it’s hot work, he said to his colleague. I could see two other men sitting in the pavilion entrance, in the shade, with coats on out of the sun. I love sitting on that bench. My tension drains away. I closed my eyes when he went off to collect the car and let the sounds of people’s chatter drift around and over me. A little boy’s voice. I don’t want it, I don’t want any. He was near me, his parents were further away. They were cajoling him, not pleading, negotiating. It was about sun tan lotion. He didn’t want any sun tan lotion on. He gave in, reluctantly. I heard him walk back towards them. Not on my nose, he shouted. Minutes later they all trooped past me. I could smell the lotion, sweet, chemical. The little boy dragged behind. I took a peek. His shoulders were hunched. He wasn’t happy. Anyway, he shouted, it’s going to be cold soon.

He bought me a coffee pot, those Italian ones that screw in half. I’ve been off coffee, but I made some in Denmark and my hankering for it has returned. What a pleasure and now the house smells of it.

The dream came fast, almost immediately I closed my eyes. I was in a garden, I’d dug some trenches. I had a wheelbarrow. My children lay in it. Docile, passive, quite content. And I took them one by one and laid them in the soil. They were not dead but alive. There was no violence, no struggle. And now for my beautiful baby, I said to the youngest as I carefully laid it down. The sun shone. Was it about planting something? Planting ideas, hopes, possibilities? It felt like the best of me.

I’ve found something. It’s a start. It felt good to know that there might be something. But I am tense with the fear of it. Keep steady. It will be an experiment, an essay in how to articulate a long-lived life. Keep steady.

It was just before I woke up. She came to me just before I woke up. She entered my space, my room. I offered her a chair. I asked if she needed light. She said she’d come to me because of the ‘meat-on-meat’ piece. In my dream I knew what she meant. I asked if she’d worked with DH, sensing he’d sent her. No, she said. But she wanted to work with me. It felt good that she’d come. But then when I looked back there was no woman, no chair, just me sitting on a blanket in the semi-half-light of a standard lamp and my room was a balcony looking out on an auditorium. I took the image of her on my walk. A short, rather cross-faced woman, with close-cropped hair. I liked the essence of her, but she gave little warmth. It felt prophetic. All of it. Even the bits I can no longer recall.

It isn’t heartburn. It may be a bruised rib, or a broken one, or a torn ligament. It is sharp-edged when I inhale. I breathe deeper now into my diaphragm.

The kitchen clock keeps stopping. I’ve told you of it before. It is radio-controlled, whatever that means. It stops then starts whirring, too fast round and round. It’s done it for the last three days. Then it stops at 12.00, thinks for a bit then starts to whirr round again till it finds the correct time. It is most disconcerting. What does it augur?

There is a Christmas tree in a room in a flat behind Alexandra Hall. It’s in the living room, unlit but still decorated. Is it just idleness or a longing for Christmas past or even Christmas future? The room was lit up but empty.

I could see a figure lurching towards me from town. A slim, tall figure. I could hear a voice. Where they on the phone? No, it was a woman, very thin with spindly legs talking to herself as she reeled about. I passed her and then heard a door slam.

Alan Ayckbourn’s mother was a writer of short stories and magazine articles. The typewriter would be going all day and all night, said the presenter of the radio programme about the playwright. Apparently she bought Alan a mini typewriter so he could sit next to her bashing the keys like her.

I want a fuller life. I want to open myself to other possibilities. I want something larger, more abundant. Is it doable? And if so, what can I do from here, from now? How can I open myself to all that I can be?

I think he was flirting with me. It’s been so long, I can no longer judge, if I ever could. Whatever it was it gave me a fillip. He didn’t have any decaff coffee. I asked why. It’s the same as me not selling non-alcoholic beer, he replied. I protested that it wasn’t, but to be fair I could see he was right. I just like the taste, I told him. I’ve got tea, he said smiling. Have you got a pot? I asked. He grinned. I have just the thing, he said, disappearing into the back room. He was young, intelligent, with excellent English. How’s you’re tea, darling? he asked later. I burst out laughing. Why, what have I said? he replied, looking flustered, shouldn’t I have said that? I explained the intimacy of the word. Don’t you have the same in word in Danish? I asked. We do, he said, but it means something completely different. Something had been crossed. I said goodbye when we left. He looked after me as I left. It was nice. I needed it. The awkwardness of spending time with new lovers had made me lonesome. My step was lighter as a consequence.

I still don’t know what to do for the best. I remain open. That is all I can do. Wait. Pay attention. And be kind.

I used to get it as a child whilst at boarding school. Their remedy was the enforced wearing of the school cloak, an antacid and if all else failed a night in the sanitorium watched over by matron. Something was hurting then, as it is now. Something that I cannot digest or swallow. It needs attending to. I’ve writing to do so I won’t linger. I have to enter my fear of it. As we journeyed we talked, raised our voices and I cried. It all helped. A boil was temporarily lanced. I’ve asked him to find me something if he can. Not milk of magnesia, I said, anything but that. Too many memories – the taste lingers even now.

It was good. I felt some joy. Thank you for that.

Thank you.