Artist and writer currently living in Aberystwyth.
I’ve hurt my lower back. I am not sure how. It could be from lying for two weeks on a far too soft mattress. I’d hoped that it would heal the moment I returned home. It hasn’t. I think of Frida Kahlo and her constant pain. I must be patient. Wait. And try not to be be snappy.
It’s only been two weeks but feels like an age. I am adrift, askew. I have forgotten all the drill. What bowl do I use for breakfast? What goes where? I slept badly. Woke with a head after a dream about my mother. Uncomfortable. It takes time, this returning. Always. Let it be. Accept each stage, however clumsy, with grace. See what is to be learnt.
I’m not good at them. Even for just one night. I am dislodged by them. My centre is here, my core, my ballast, eventhough here is far from perfect and certainly not my dream. It is what I know. What I share with him. And leaving it is hard. Even for the promise of rest. Funny that.
There was a note left in my studio for when I got up. Sorry, it said, I’ve dropped the iPad and it no longer works. I was touched by the ‘sorry’. The pain and frustration is his not mine. He uses it daily. Relies on it. He’s handled its loss well. I am proud of him. I love his steadiness. It is my ballast. Always.
He crows about the possibility of a peace deal. Peace, a beautiful thing, he says. But at what cost? My heart breaks at the smaller man having to go cap in hand to the big one. He has lost so much. Must he lose more? When will this darkness end? And then there are the women and girls of Afghanistan. How could I have forgotten them? Denied education and a life beyond the home. Who can save them? And those of Gaza? What can be done for them? What a mess we have made.
He’s paused military aid. Whether this is out of spite or a wish to instigate peace whatever the cost for that poor beleagured nation, who knows? Whatever the reason it sends a chill through me. Let something happen, anything to protect him and his people. Let there be light, and goodness, and kindness and a willingness for harmony. Can it be? Ever?
It was a cathedral of sound this morning as I walked. Initially it was a lone blackbird’s song that appeared to echo and ricochet off this town’s terraced houses. It was a warble followed by a whistle and then something like a little laugh, a guffaw before the warble began again. As I returned home others had joined him. I cannot name them all but there were more warblings and whistles but also clickings and tickings. Maybe a robin, some tits and possibly some chiff chaffs. I don’t know. Does it matter? It was glorious.
I felt a frisson of hope, or at least a sense that there is a trace of goodness and loyalty in this ever-increasingly harsh world. The King is to invite that beleagured leader to the Palace today. It’s a show of support. A standing-by, a nation next to another. I am glad. Let it bear fruit.
He told me that his wife was a dental hygienist. It wasn’t what I’d expected. It pleased me. A normal job, a grounded one, a caring, doing-something-for-others kind of a job. A nine-to-five, regular kind of job. Yes, it pleased me. And it wasn’t what I expected.
We’ve been re-watching Still Alice. This must be our third viewing of it. I like revisiting films, one notices things one’s missed. I thought about the title yesterday at breakfast. Of course it applies to the fact that though she is living with Alzheimer’s, she is still herself, still Alice. But I mused about the way in which she and her husband are portrayed as forever doing – working, running, socialising whatever – and that her affliction will enforce a stillness upon her. She will have to stop, as all of us will, eventually. To slow down. To be stilled.