Category: Writings

I saw her legs first. You couldn’t miss them, encased as they were in tight black and white striped leggings. Then there were her boots. Mauve, high-laced Doc Martens. Over her leggings she wore a figure-hugging black skirt and on top of that a short, fake-fur beige jacket. She was standing in front of one of the terrace houses on South Road leaning over under the light of street lamp rooting through her handbag that she’d rested on a window sill. I recognised the nose jewellery. An Indian style loop of jangly silver things, bells and filigree. And then there was the unmistakable streaked hair (on Monday it was a series of stripes of blue, black and purple) and the thick black kohl drawn around her eyes. She looked amazing. Unmissable. The Tesco checkout-girl, aka fire-eater. She didn’t look up as I passed. And I didn’t say hello. It was out of context and inappropriate. Who wants to be reminded of their day job when out on the town, dressed-to-kill? I like her. She has such a ‘sunny disposition’. And I love the dressing-up. I used to do it all those years ago. She isn’t a beautiful girl but she is tall, graceful and very, very striking. Good for her.

I got through yesterday. And it was alright. Today I shall write. Do my thousand words and then put it away. I need to keep it alive, though I’ve no idea where it is going. Don’t plan, he advises. See what happens, what comes out. I don’t mind being in the writing once I’ve begun, it’s the beginning. Ach! Isn’t it always the way? And nothing is happening. No one is replying. The world has gone to sleep. Dormant. So be it. I shall see what comes forth into this emptiness.

I couldn’t quite make out what it was. Was it a woman crying? I continued walking towards it. Was it someone playing some music? Could it be music? My mother used to describe the Kate Bush albums I played as a teenager as sounding like that. Caterwauling, she called it. And that was exactly what the sound was. A cat. I could see it now. It was on the bottom of Penglais Hill. There were two of them. A black one and a ginger one. I couldn’t make out who was making the sound. A guttural, then a kind of growling sound, which would break out into a sort of yelling. It wasn’t in danger clearly but it was warning the other off. Was it a female on heat? Who knows? It’s a world we have no access to. And the night is their time. They can see. They prowl. They hunt. A vicious time, I think. No wonder they sleep during the day.

The air was warm again. Though there was a chill breeze. I watched the shadow of a single leaf still clinging to a branch jostle and dance precariously in the wind. Is the eventual break from its mother tree a painful one for a leaf, or is it a release? A pleasant falling?

She was lovely to listen to. She sounded kind. I will read her book. So much delight in the return of so many species, the butterflies, the birds, the mushrooms and wild flowers. Do they get cornflowers too? And wild poppies? And then there was her mother and the ‘Fine Cell Work’ project. Sounds fascinating. Perhaps I could get involved. The Magna Carta one is amazing. What a feat. I need that mass.

We had to sit on our hands, she kept saying, and do nothing. Leave it alone. Leave the land alone to heal. Heal itself. I remember that from school. Sitting on your hands was a punishment. A don’t touch penance.

A busy day today. Breathe through it. All will be well.

He was ahead of me. He had a dog on a lead. It’s amazing how many people I have seen walking dogs in the wee small hours of the morning. He was young, a student perhaps. His gait was awkward, a little gawky. I followed behind him as he and then I joined the Prom. The dog was young too, just over puppyhood and it pulled at the lead. A little nervous, jumpy. The man took out an electric cigarette. At least, I couldn’t see him do so but suddenly there was this great cloud of smoke. And I’d smelt something sweet in his wake. It smelt of pipe tobacco and warm boiled sweets. The smoke hung in the air, barely moving. The air was not cold, almost balmy and wet and heavy. Autumnal. The smoke was beautiful, hanging there. A halo, a fog of white.

I peered into the Christmas Room again as I passed by. There are decorations all over the mantlepiece too. Though I’ve never seen anyone in there. It is an invitation to partake of seasonal cheer. Waiting. Waiting for its guests.

I am like a dog with a bone, I know. I can’t leave things alone, things that go unresolved. I worry away at them. And she is so different to me. She has her own way. A learnt way, of putting off, of not dealing with now. I need to be more compassionate, more understanding of other ways of looking.

She prompted me to read it. Rachel Cusk’s essay about Celia Paul and Cecily Brown. Powerful. Full of my own struggles. There is no resolution there either. Should we be what we are or try to be like others? That eternal question. And the other? Who exactly are we?

I pass it when I walk along North Road and then up past the back of Alexandra Hall. It’s one of a row of small, thin three-storey terraced houses that follow the bend up the hill to the golf course, I think. They look like student houses, there are empty bottles in the windows and curtains hang awry. I see this particular house from the bottom of the hill. It is lit up. A whole array of lights have been hung in the window of the ground floor front room. They look like a net of blue and green and white decorative lights. They’ve been on since the beginning of November, flashing comfortingly in the still thick dark. I am glad for them. Grateful even. Yesterday I peered into the room, beyond the curtain of lights. There was a lit Christmas tree in the corner, and I believe I saw parcels too. And there were fluorescent snowflake shapes also stuck to the window. The room glowed with festiveness. A boon. I get it. I understand it. And a part of me longs to put up our lights too, though they are modest enough, just for the fillip. But I will wait. Ever the one to hold back of pleasure – saving it, Flora-style as we always say.

I forgot to call her. Yesterday was an itchy, troubled, scratchy sort of day. First the nurse and all that I associate with encountering traditional medicine. She talked of my ‘history’ affecting how I would heal. I went about my finger. I felt a little silly. She was kind, gentle but even so. It may always be a little swollen and red, she said. Fair enough, perfection is no longer doable. Then I found myself telling her about the loss of fluid, a stone, I said. Then I regretted it. How, what has changed? she asked. Then I told of her the lymph drainage and immediately wished I hadn’t. It’s like oil and water – the traditional and the alternative don’t mix. And I am so firmly in the latter camp. I felt skinned. Skinless. Then there was the stuff about the new camera and all my fears and paranoia that I bring to the job. All me. Not them. I wept. He understood. You’re only human, he said. So kind. Then I discovered that the tape I’d made of our seminar is too quiet. Ugh. I fail and trip up daily. Ah, me.

I remembered I hadn’t called her at lunchtime and did so. But not for long. It was the wrong time. So I passed on my apologies and said I would speak to her next Friday. She sounded buoyant. I went, she said. I went to the dinner. It took a little while to remember. Of, course, and she’d been so nervous, hadn’t wanted to go but her daughter had arranged a car. I had a nice time, she said. I’m so pleased. So proud of her. It is enough. Such small victories to some are huge.

He always helps me. He is so kind, thoughtful and attentive to my concerns. We went. There was time. And it was marvellous. How I love going there. It is nothing special, rather antiquated in fact. Slow. But it’s it’s slowness that appeals to me. The lounge was almost empty when we arrived. Just two men, sitting on separate sofas, sleeping. I love it’s quietness, no muzak, no kids, no shouting. The noisiest and indeed youngest people there are the staff. The residents are ancient. They hobble about, sleep, drink tea or stand at the windows, leaning on sticks staring out at the sea and the golf links, dreaming of younger days, perhaps. We talked, I dug it out of me. It’s like a scourging, a purging. And he understands, he pays attention and gives me back the gift of loving me, of appreciating me. I never want to leave and look with something like envy upon those who have just checked in. To stay there (though what I’d eat, God knows – they just about muster up some soya milk but anything more outlandish they would be floored) to just stay there stretched out on the sofa drinking endless cups of tea, reading, talking, doing crosswords, drawing, thinking and dozing. Bliss. Absolute bliss.

And when we get home we are both exhausted but full. I have gained a little more understanding of the need to accept what is, and that patterns can and should to be changed, as does my attitude to what constitutes work. And what I require to fire me up, to fulfil me. I’m clearly a little better for I am looking outward again, a spark of ambition kindling within. That is good, n’est-ce-pas?

‘I’ve a desire to be astounding,’ said the late actor, impresario-director, wild-man Ken Campbell. And he did it. He achieved it. He was. Such energy. Such imagination. Such confidence.

Where does the desire to be astounding fit within Einstein’s plea for the quiet, modest life? I am torn. Split two ways. I don’t know what I am any more. What I should be or be doing. I need guidance. Mostly, I need help in accepting what is. Though I suspect that this in itself is my lifetimes’ work.

The doorbell went twice yesterday. Once for a delivery and the other with Jehovah’s Witnesses. I don’t want to be rude, ever. Not face to face, on the phone I am less kind. I try. But I fail. There were two of them. Two women, I think a mother and daughter. The mother-figure hung back, was the younger girl in training? The girl look a little old-fashioned, just like my friend from all those years ago used to. A little behind. She wore her hair down, long but caught back with a clip. She had on a grey pencil skirt cut away a little at the front. And a cardigan, I think. They always start with a question. How do you see the future? So there can be simple answer, I suppose. I smiled at them. I don’t want to do this, I said. I have my faith. I said. And I do, though it is often chaotic, I wanted to say but didn’t, wavery, uncertain and not based on any organised religion. I thanked them. They smiled back. Take care, I said. They are trying to do what they think is right. What they think is kind. They are trying to save us. I can respect that. It can’t be easy. Do they get much abuse. Is that why they send women?

We are off soon. There is space, there is time. Goody. Let’s see what we can unravel. May the greyness lift, eh?

Smell is my strongest sense, I think. They take me over sometimes. Sometimes with joy, other times with distaste. The stink from downstairs is still there. I will have to burn some sage when I sweep the hallway tomorrow. They are containers of memory. I’ve been trying to buy more eco-friendly and bodily-friendly cleaning products and have just used the new wood polish (twice the price of the poisonous stuff – why?) and was overtaken by the smell of it. What was it? Something familiar. I smelt and thought. Smelt and thought. And then it came. Bakewell tarts, Mr Kipling’s individual bakewell tarts. Almond essence. Gorgeous. I remember them as a child. We were living on the farm then, in Lancashire. The six little Kipling’s cakes came in a box with their picture on the front. Each one utterly perfect and neat in their silver foil cases, with their white icing feathered with a pattern of brown lines. The icing, then the jam and then the almond middle, slightly sticky, fudgy. And there was always a glace cherry on the top. Half a cherry, if I remember correctly. When did we used to eat them? My mother was never one for cakes in those days. Was it when we entertained? Had people round? Never for tea. A Sunday? There was those little fancies too, in the pastel shades of yellow and pink, wrapped in marzipan. Girly cakes. The bakewells felt more refined. And I’ve always loved the taste of nuts.

I woke from a dream about my mother’s things. Someone was with me, a Radio Cymru presenter (AH) and he wanted a whisky. I rooted through her cupboards. The house looked like it was being packed up. Where was it England, Spain? There were bottles but no whisky. I explained about having to pour so many away. The cupboards kept changing every time I looked. And I was expecting her to turn up, at any moment. I was edgy. I found a bottle of Haig, eventually, a huge thing. Now I had to find a glass. I searched through the cupboards again – there were lots of white and painted porcelain dishes, knick-knacks, all of no usefulness. No glass. I found a cup, I think, but woke before I could pour it.

We watch box sets. Silly things. Escapism. In the one last night one of the characters had hurt his back and he was lying in bed feeling useless, unable to work. What use am I, he said to his wife, when I can’t work? I’m left here alone all day, with just my thoughts. I’ve been low over the last few days. I know it. And he has noticed. I’m stuck, blocked, stagnant. He has agreed to a seminar tomorrow, if work allows. I need to talk it out. Whatever this ennui is. Uselessness. A not knowing what to do, what work is anymore? All the above and more. They’ve put a new camera in at work. No one told us. She talked about big organisations as being like drains. Beware, she said, long before I ever worked there. Beware.

I felt stripped bare yesterday, skinless, and exposed. I think it was from listening to the radio docudrama about the man who left his family for over 18 months and to all intents and purposes disappeared. It was so moving, so gripping and with no happy endings (though I’ve not reached the end quite yet). The man talked about sleeping rough, drinking, feeling like he was dissolving, and waking up to being pissed on. My heart opened to him to them his family, so much so that when I had to go out, out into the world to deal with ordinary things I was unprepared, fragile. And then work. Everything clanged and clashed. I drank too much tea to compensate and my nerves jangled. Then coming home there was the smell.

He couldn’t smell it. What is it? he asked. I couldn’t describe it. A stink. A rank odour. It smelt of rotting vegetation, fish, guano. It was bitter and acrid, vinegary. It stank of what I imagine lutfisk smells like when the tin is finally opened after months of ‘curing’ or should I say rotting. It seems to be coming from our neighbours’ flat downstairs. Had someone died? Was it a decomposing body? No, I heard cutlery against plates. Were they eating it? That foul odour, was it actually food? It was still there this morning. I left the back door open wide to the cold morning air but it makes little difference, it is still eeking out. How can they stand it? Or is it just me, being too sensitive. I lit a sage stick and walked around the flat wafting it, trying to avoid setting off the smoke alarms.

A cold walk. The moon is shrinking and the light dwindling. We go deeper into the tunnel of winter.

He stopped me as I walked past. I’d seen him ahead of me. The Prom, except for this man, was empty. A whole stretch of emptiness. I was wary. He was standing in front of a row of B&Bs as if he’d just come out of one of them. What made him stand out was the fact that he was only wearing shorts, socks and no shoes, and it was what, only 5 or 6 degrees out there. He called out to me, and pointed at the sky and then moving closer showed me his phone. The screen revealed a online article about the meteor shower due that morning. I remembered hearing about it. He pointed up at the sky ahead. He was clearly have trouble articulating what he wanted to say. Was he pissed? His accent was North Walian, though he spoke to me in English. The photographers are all down there, he said, pointing towards the harbour. It’s at five past three, he said, again pointing at the sky. Thank you for letting me know, I said, and walked on. Keep looking, he shouted after me. And I did. And kept looking. Nothing.

I don’t know what a meteor shower looks like. And as I made my way home I could see that clouds had begun to form across the semi-moon. Did I miss it? I had kept looking up, feeling a little silly like some ever-hopeful Chicken Licking.

I need a seminar, my love. Can we go and sit and I can talk it through? So many things swirling, it would be good to ground some of it. Glimmers of hopefulness come through. I think it is the sun. Off to add a codicil to my Will soon. A change of name, that’s all. I want it all neat and tidy, ready, taken care of. I think about it often, the leaving, and how to do it neatly. It’s all I can do really. Wrap it. Order it. Taking care.

I heard it several times overheard, flying over our roof. They must be looking for someone, he said, his head bent over the newspaper. It was early, before 6 am. It’s a sinister sound. I don’t know why. Insistent, like an insect buzzing, chasing, haranguing.

I dreamt I was trying to make a dress and the pattern I was working from was a lot more complicated than I’d bargained for. (How like life. And indeed this sampler I’m working on for one of the poppets. Ugh, I keep mis-counting, and I want to throw a tantrum at my incompetence.) I kept looking back at the picture on the pattern. It looked like a wedding dress but the loose folds at the front of the bodice didn’t appeal to me. Did I really want to make this dress? I kept asking myself. Then I saw other images of women in it, though the dress had changed. Then I saw bits of women’s torsos – naked, like a painting. Then I was due to start teaching again, or was I just applying? It was at a post-ed college – and someone was telling me about all the meetings I’d have to attend. Some are at midnight, the person was saying. My heart sank. Do I really want all that back? Then my colleague at work was on the phone, could I do the booking for midnight? Why can’t you do it? I wanted to ask. I’d do it, he said, but I have to drive all the next day. Alright, I said, I’ll do it. Then I woke, a little before my alarm.

A cloudy day. Writing done and sent. One more to do. Sewing today and my fingers are already sweaty with the tension of doing it wrong. Will she notice? It’s a bit like one of the Spot the Difference puzzles my niece and nephew love to do. Who can spot that the giraffes are not exactly the same size?