Artist and writer currently living in Aberystwyth.
He read out the gist of her article. We hadn’t wanted to face it yesterday. Sudan is far away. I cannot grasp their misery, their fear and horror. I want to stand by them but know I can’t. Does knowledge help? Is it all we can do – read about it, rail and curse at their misfortune? Show us another way.
He does it to me sometimes. Or should I say, I allow him to do it? Is it about being made to feel small or is it more about being rejected? He wanted to read and I wanted to talk. It was that simple. No one was wrong. Except that he was, what I felt to be, unpleasant about it. It’s his manner sometimes. Imperious, irritated, short. I withdraw, go quiet and he pokes at me as a result. It’s just bickering. That’s all. Nothing in the whole scheme of this but it makes for a bitter taste.
I wobble a lot, never being sure of the right thing to do. Perhaps that’s part of the human condition. Perhaps not. It gives me anxiety. I want to do what is correct, unhurtful, good. And that is not always clear.
Oh, I ache for them. Such fear. We cannot close ourselves off to it all. To live is to hurt, to be open to random attacks, unprotected. Let them live and be unafraid.
I watch him arrive from our upstairs kitchen window., his headlights breaking through the black. He comes in a pick-up truck, as most milkmen do these days. When I was a child it was always a float, a rather innocuous vehicle that made, as far as I remember, a gentle, lulling kind of purring sound as in made its way along the estates and streets of my youth. I recall with even more pleasure the man who used to deliver our Nanny’s milk and dairy supplies on a horse-drawn cart. The man of today runs out of his cab, a light fixed to his baseball cap, drops off the pinta and jumps back in again. And then there is the darkness again….
Was it me that I was looking at through that window? Was that small woman in a leotard, smiling and doing yoga, and oh so small, me? Is it to do with anorexia, do you think? I asked my companion. Yes, he said. Was it me? A silly dream. A nothing in comparison to the horrors that they are experiencing in Jamaica. So much destruction. Poor loves. I hope the rest of world sends aid. Now.
It was such a distinct image. I see it still, though it was just a dream. I was trying to lock the door of a toilet. It was one in a wooden house. I wanted privacy, to feel safe. The lock or metal latch looked like it wouldn’t reach the hook that waited for it. Scores of circular lines had been made on the wall by others who had tried it. I reached over to secure it and it worked. It worked. It felt like a success.
And then in real time, in real life there is this horror, this misery. Storms and landslides, houses to be destroyed, lives lost. I cannot imagine it. The fear. The grief. I wish them safety and aid and for the world to not forget them.
I feel it, for him and for his victims. He must’ve been scared. Unexpectedly free, but free for what. Where was he to go? What am I supposed to do, he was reported to have said. Life must be a chaos for him. I hope he finds some stability.
And I am. What is it about? The weather, the dark, the cold, the jaggedness of my hips, my sciatica, the endless, nay relentless work? I don’t know. But I am sorry about it. For I know that so many, too many, have lives that are abject in the extreme. I am blessed but I forget this daily, hourly. Forgive me. I will try harder.
Some days are like that. And it was a seven. I usually anticipate those with pleasure. Yesterday didn’t rise to the occasion. Though of course, it was me, not the day. Days are just days, not real, just carved-out sections of time between light and dark. I became rattled. I unravelled. It was fear of course. It tends to be. He was a saint. He helped. He always does. I am blessed.
I’m not sure why. Though it’s undoubtedly self-pity. My body hurts and doesn’t work as it ought. Stress of course, and tiredness and the my forever dread of the onset of winter. I must shake myself out of it. Now. It’s not warranted, ever. I have so much. So many gifts. Live it. Be and be not afraid….