Author: Ellen Bell

I went to bed early and slept long and uninterrupted. Long dreams of making, loving and washing.

The parents return and I am glad to let go, to hand back responsibility. I have loved playing parent, for that was all it was. Not a game exactly, but a role assumed. I’ve loved their beingness, the sometime-adult, sometime-child-ness of them both. And caring. As I do. But it is tiring. And I am used to pleasing myself. Well almost. And now the next concern takes over. Let me draw well and be kind.

I creep along the corridor, open the door and slide in under the duvet. My feet are ice. The sheets are white and chill against my skin. I cannot muster the bodily warmth to heat them. I fold the duvet in two and hope for sleep. It comes. Soon.

I dreamt of the house in Spain. My work was everywhere. The agent had arranged an open day to attract buyers. They all spent the time viewing my work. Some were sellotaped to the wall. I’d forgotten it was there. That they were there.

I wanted to stay with him. I wanted the warmth of him. The thought of the other bed made me feel cold, chilled. But I went. The snoring was too much and my need for uninterrupted sleep paramount. I went and folded over the duvet in two. I slept.

It is always discombobulating for me. I feel adrift. Which of course, I am. I wake in a strange bed, too early, and when the rest of the house is fast asleep. There is no helping it. My body is used to waking in the wee hours. Outside it is pitch. I can hear the rain, heavy. P. snores next to me. I’ve been to the loo, done some yoga, drawn and read. I long to make tea, eat and shower. But not yet. Not yet.

The damp stain on my bedroom ceiling has got worse. I only noticed its creeping yesterday. It unsettles me. It is the boiler, most probably. And then the torrential rain woke me. Water, water all around.

He was always a tender being. Or at least, that is how I’ve always seen him. Masked, he hides his tenderness. A boy-man. A treasured child. Things are broken for him, it seems. He is loved. That must help. But will he talk, will he unburden the burden he carries. Those sins of the forefathers. He is clean of it. I try to reach him. A little. He doesn’t want it. He closes off. I understand. I tread more carefully these days. Respecting another’s privacy and need to grieve. Is that it? Is is grief? Hold him. Please.

I’m a stealer of words. Or perhaps I should say an appropriator, a borrower of them. I read this word this morning. Sara Maitland used it after quoting someone else who used it. Urgencies. The urgencies of life that eat into a deep desire (that I always rediscover in myself after rereading and reading again Maitland’s book). I’ve spent the weekend attending to such urgencies. It is small stuff, irritating stuff that if left fills my head leaving no room for the soaring things. I am better for dealing with them. But there is yet more. Heigh ho. Onward.

It takes time. I wonder if most people feel the same. I’m stirred-up by travelling, adrift, lost almost. And coming home isn’t easy either. Putting everything back in place, and that smell about the place that I can never identify. I am just as lost (and irritable). The next day and then the next grow better. I clean the house. I wash the clothes. I cook. I walk. I try to refind myself in this space, this life. And then long to be away again.

I went seeking some sun. Just a little. And on my face. I went to the little park that was once a maze. The man who is always there, lying flat out on a bench sun-bathing, was there, as were two women, smoking and talking. I sat down on the bench just before theirs. I shut my eyes. I wanted to listen, not to them, necessarily but to all the sounds around me. I heard the metallic click of one of the women’s Zippo lighter. I smelt the acrid stink of cigarette. Somewhere, in one of the gardens along North Road, someone was trying to start up a petrol-fired lawn mower. I heard the chock of a tennis ball. A man was coming towards me down the path. He walked self-consciously with small, tentative steps. I heard the chirrup of small birds. Where they blue tits or sparrows? A heard the song of blackbird. I heard car engines, tyres on tarmac and gulls. No silence. But it was restful. And the sun, though filmy, did warm my skin.