ellen bell

He said that his occluded eye had improved, more than he could’ve hoped, apparently. Isn’t that an amazing thing? He seems rather sanguine about it. But to me it is a sign of a healthy constitution. It is still fuzzy but he says that he can make out more shapes.

We talked of her garden and the impact of the recent rain and wind. She seemed distracted having just come in from a wet walk. I could hear the dog barking outside. The storms have destroyed their runner beans and the courgettes that ‘were coming beautiful’ have begun to rot. I couldn’t lift her. I’m in a muddle today, she said. Sometimes I can’t make it right. I wish I could. I worry about sharing snippets of our conversations here on this page. I keep her anonymous and it is only a way of celebrating her. For I do. That soft lyricism of her voice and her concerns spoken so quietly, continue to move me. She has been nowhere since the lockdown was first imposed. Let this sharing be alright. I would never wish to wound.

A wild morning but he has gone out nevertheless. Has summer ended?

I’ve struggled to sleep these last few nights. The day before yesterday I tried reading a William Trevor short story thinking it might help to make me tired. It did the opposite, the beautiful succinctness of the writing stirred me up.

He bought the radio for me, did I tell you? It is now on my table all washed clean as I’d dreamt it would be. And it’s perfect. The tone is good and the dial was on my station, the one I listen to in the mornings. Thank you. It was unnecessary, I have umpteen radios but it is a pleasure nonetheless. It’s an objet d’art, he told the woman in the shop. Well, she said.

I saw two baby gulls as I walked. One was lying in the road, taking a nap, I think, all tucked up and neat. The other was on the Prom, its feathers ruffled, looking lost. They seem so bleak, so alone, so abandoned.

It’s raining outside so he won’t walk. In fact I can hear him snoring now. I, on the other hand have work to do. More anon.

He was on my bedroom wall, the greenness of him stark against the magnolia. How had he got there? I thought grasshopper jumped not flew. I know so little. I picked him up carefully with a piece of loo paper and put him out of the window. Five minutes later he was on the window. He paused for a bit and we both watched as he appeared to be cleaning himself. Then he began to climb. They’ve got suckers, he said. Within a couple of minutes he was gone. Had he gone onto the roof?

The morning are dark now. There was no moon. The wind had got up, and straggles of my hair caught in my mouth. It felt bleak. The woman with the bag was at the other end of the Prom. She must’ve seen me advancing for she turned into ‘the ship’ and waited till I’d passed. I understand. I often feel that way about other people too. I walked down Great Darkgate Street to get out of the wind and saw a Greggs’ lorry parked on the pavement. The driver was wheeling some crates from the lit shop. Good morning, he called to me as I passed. I felt a little lighter for it. It was 4.15 am and he sounded so cheerful. I replied in kind and walked with a more buoyant step. It’s all OK, I thought. It is.

The ground was still wet but I went to pick some anyway. There were loads of them, some still small but very juicy. They came away from the stalk like a dream. It became quite compulsive, though many of the best ones were too high for me to reach. The sun shone quite unexpectedly. The damp soil smelt strange. I can’t really describe it. I didn’t really like the smell. It smelt of clay with a hint of dog poo. It stuck to my shoes. My footwear wasn’t appropriate.

I had to bring the call to a swift conclusion. I felt bad about it. She’d been talking about meeting friends in her conservatory to do some painting. Her son was due to visit that evening. She is lonely. She is a gregarious, social being. It will be nice to have someone to say good morning to and good night to, she said. Yes. It is as simple as that sometimes. Poor love. She does well. That is, she manages. But I suspect she is lonely and sad sometimes. And she is too smiling a woman to be sad. I didn’t give as much of myself to her as I ought to have done. I am sorry. Next time I will be better. I promise.

I found a piece of blue and white in the soil. An old piece, I think. Not a transfer, certainly. A small treasure.

I dreamt about it. I had it. I don’t know how. But I was washing it under the tap, cleaning it of all previous owners. It was now my radio. Mine.

I see it every morning in the window of the second-hand shop. It’s nestled next to a large glittery head of buddha and surrounded by bits of china. The window display is not what you’d call minimal. There is a clarinet in a blue-velvet-lined case balanced on top of a train set with two miniature camper vans standing on each corner. A trumpet, a ukulele and a guitar hang from hooks on one of the side walls. The rest is mostly tat. I like it though. I pass it twice on my walk and sometimes linger a little on my way home letting my eye roam over the jumbled array.

Her other son must be visiting now. He isn’t due back from Ireland for a few days yet. I know this because we could hear his saxophone through the floor and walls. At first I thought it was a cello. Perhaps it was but it’s unlikely. It’s not so easy to take one of those on a plane. He practised and played for well over three hours. It irritated him but I quite liked it.

It was a hard listen. Beautifully acted by Ronald Pickup but a hard and bitter tale. At one point he told of his father telling him a story about Shackleton wandering in the snow in search of help with his two companions. He was convinced there were four of them as they trudged. There wasn’t. Just the three. He called it ‘Divine Providence’ – a helping hand, and accompanying. I like the idea. And sometimes I feel it too but it inside not out. His father told him the story to help the boy sleep.

The clouds have cleared a little. There is more blue than they promised. A good omen, eh?

The sun came out unexpectedly yesterday late afternoon so we went to sit out after supper. A man was there striding off into the wilderness with a tupperware bowl in his hand. He was there the whole time we were there ferreting among the bushes for blackberries. He got cross. Why doesn’t he just f*** off? he said. I was edgy too. Not sure why. Perhaps I was envious and wanted to collect some too. Will there be any left after he is finished? I love the idea of foraging. Nature giving freely. He seemed to know where to go. Had he been doing the same thing for years? We said hello when he passed us on his way home. He lives in the big house we stare at when we sit. We chatted for a bit. He seems a nice man, he said after he’d gone.

Another night of rich dreaming. You don’t need to bring your own pyjamas, the man who was to be my lover in my dream told me. I liked him. He made me laugh.

So much of it is. And I suppose the secret of contentment is navigating it with something like acceptance. I like the order of it, the routinous doing of the usual, the habitual though aware all the time of a part of me that wants to rebel, to run, to throw it all in. I walk the same streets, the same promenade, I do the washing and the cleaning on the same days each week. Routine holds me in place but it also imprisons me. Don’t you feel that? Work is the same. I need order. I need to know what I am to do each day. I need to know that I can solve it. Which I don’t always. Know, that is. I solve each one, each challenge, at least to the best of my ability but even in that, even in that thrill of the solving there is the humdrum waiting in the wings. That, is that all there is? So be it.

I didn’t know depression could be like that. He writes about it so powerfully. I couldn’t listen to it all, it was too much in one sitting. Funny how what I listen to colours the work that I am doing. And when I return to the work I remember the sounds, the voices, the words.

Time to work. Gentle work today. I want to write about what sewing means to me. Like he did. Delving. There is more to unravel, I think.

He’s never liked it on me. He said it drowned me. It was a little big, I admit. But she bought it for me as a birthday present. Nevertheless, I gave it away a few days ago. And then last night, in my dream, there was a man who walked passed me in a cafe wearing it. He had it over his jeans. He smiled at me as he passed. I knew his face. He was small, grey-haired, quite handsome. Who was he? I wanted to tell him that I’d seen my dress. He would’ve laughed then, as he did when I told him this morning.

Her cat has had another litter of kittens. Five this time. She told me how her daughter sat with her during it, rubbing her tummy. I asked about her tomatoes. One has ripened. Only one. And she told me how the collie had been frightened of the thunder. I love to hear her tales. Am I doing wrong in sharing them with you? I keep her name safe. She is safe. It’s another life to me and one that I cherish being a part of however small.

Another project to start. It always makes me a little nervous even if it is just for myself. I worry so much about failing. Being clumsy, foolish. I feel so small. A little jot on the earth. So be it. Can’t that be OK?

I want to write to them all. All those people that for the moment I cannot go and see. I find emails so unsatisfactory. They are fast, certainly but there is no beauty to them, no personal touch. So I’ve begun writing letters. I cannot say how they are received. Perhaps they are seen as weighty, and coming with an expectation of a return. I hope not. There is no obligation. I do it for myself mostly. I want to be with them to hold them in my thoughts for a while and to send a gift of a letter seems a nice act. Is it not? The letters reflect the people I write them to. Some are short others long and thoughtful. I feel love for those people, those warm beings who have both peppered and affected my life. I hope they feel it.

Now I must get to work. There is much to do and solve. And it is to be rice for a week so no oat-milky tea, alas.

He’s gone to Ireland leaving his mother to his brother’s care. He won’t need to do much, for at 101 she is still very self-sufficient. We heard his voice through the kitchen window as we walked past. The next one is an anagram, he shouted. He needs to shout or at least talk loudly for she is profoundly deaf. It begins N O, he continued. They do crosswords together too. Like us. Though often I get a little cross, my mind doesn’t function too well until I have some food, then, apparently I get rather blase.

I went out yesterday. It gave me some anxiety even though it was to do not unpleasant things. And to see women that I like and admire. Hair has been removed and hair has been cut. I am neater. I asked about their business. They are working to half capacity. And they have to wear those dreadful shields. It makes one feel impure. I wore my mask. Few people around town did.

I managed to walk before the rain came. Thank you for that. Today I shall solve it. I um and ah. Let it be light. And kind. And joyful.