ellen bell

I saw its lights as I approached the harbour. It was huge and lit up like the ghost ship of Coleridge’s Ancient Mariner. It looked unearthly. I walked towards the pergyl first before rounding the railings and turning down towards the harbour. It was all pitch black at first and then I saw them, what looked like six men humping big plastic sacks of stuff into the back of a juggernaut. The lights from the trawler was the only source of light and that coming from the back of the lorry. I thought of smugglers from long ago working in the dead of night, undercover, hushed-voices, working quickly, hurriedly, each only too aware of the danger. Unnoticed by the men I squeezed my way through the channel between the truck and the piles of ropes and lobsters nets built up against the wall of the boat club. The left–hand door of the front cab was beginning to open as I passed. I could still possibly get through but then I was seen. I felt uncomfortable, spotted, as if I was somehow trespassing. It was a young lad, clearly hitching a ride with his father or as company perhaps through the long drive over the mountains. His hair was short, dark, he saw me and pulled the door back to let me pass. Thank you, I called out though I was uncertain if he heard me. It was nothing and yet, in the dark, it felt dramatic, potent, alive.

I took her some biscuits but this time she was awake and walking towards the other side of the Prom as I approached. I walked faster so as to catch her up, then, saying nothing I just handed her the packet of oatcakes and touched her arm before walking on. What did she do? he asked at breakfast. Nothing, I said, she just looked rather annoyed as if to say, is that it? He laughed. It doesn’t matter. I did what felt right. If she doesn’t want them she can discard them. One mustn’t expect sweetness, she has a hard life, though I was pleased to notice that she was dressed in warm clothes, particularly her boots, they looked like a kind of reindeer fur. In fact, if it wasn’t for the dark of her hair she could be a Sami.

I woke from a fearful dream, though when I told him of it it just seemed silly. In my dream I’d woken and heard a sound in our hallway. I never dream about this flat, so that was unusual. Someone was coming up the stairs. It was my usual time of waking and it was dark. I was terrified and couldn’t call out his name. I tried to articulate it but terror made it impossible. And it was him. He’d been out to sleep in the tennis club. He said that he’d been frightened sleeping here and had gone over there, though he added, the breakfast was a bit pedestrian. I was so hurt. So hurt that he’d just left in the night like that without telling me and that he’d found comfort, safety, sleep elsewhere. In my waking hours walking I’ve struggled to make sense of where such an anxiety dream has sprung from.

Still pitch out there and he’s gone for his walk. The second load of washing has been done, just the drying now. Then tea. I finished my last article yesterday and now it’s time to rest awhile. Good. Enjoy your Sunday. x

I have taken her things. Yesterday it was some satsumas, two mince pies and a pair of socks. Today it was two shortbread biscuits. I leave them on the far end of the Prom Shelter bench she is sleeping on, just beyond her little square red suitcase. I approach quietly so as not to waken or frighten her. They are small gestures. Offerings of solidarity, of awareness, of, I am all too aware, scant comfort. I think of her each night and wish her a home, safety and warmth. I hope she is safe there. And I wonder what has brought her here. Why here, of all places? He tells me she can’t speak English. How did she find her way here? What does she dream of? What did she think she’d find here? He thought she was in her 60s but perhaps she is younger and poverty and homelessness has cast an ageing care across her features. There but for the grace of God……May the grace of God deliver her.

He tried to articulate it but though I tried to question him I didn’t really understand what he meant. It happens whenever I see young children, he said. I get this kind of physical response, a kind of shiver that goes through my whole body. I asked if he got the same feeling when he saw H and K. No, he said, they have to be strangers. I think it is about a profound sense of empathy, of feeling for them, their vulnerability, the journey they must go on but I cannot be sure. His childhood was so happy, so safe, so contained, that at times he has struggled to leave it. Our experiences have been so different.

He was so open, so ready to embrace what I had to say, I hadn’t expected it. What a good man, what a warm man. I am pleased, though daunted. So be it. Grant me the courage and the energy and the stamina to see it through and make it a success for him and the whole Centre. I feel welcome there. His assistant remembered my name. It took me by surprise. And I sat a while with the lettering exhibit and saw it anew. He talked. He is so full of stories of life of joy for his metier. I am bowled over. Keep me steady but with one eye open for joy.

It rang in my head as I woke. It had been the title of his lecture. Help is hand. I’d seen it written on his sheet of notes. We surrounded the stage. It was more performance than lecture. I saw my friend H in the distance. She had been with me but had chosen to sit apart for the talk. I watched her as she settled herself in the chair. I was both above him and directly before him. Dream views can be like that. Not necessarily from just one direction. He prepared to start and instead of talking began behaving like a horse, a child’s version of horse where they smack their thighs as if it is a whip and start to gallop. Round and round he went, making horsey sounds. How funny dreams are, it made sense to me at the time. Of course, I thought, he is acting out a wild west movie where he is either waiting for the cavalry or he is the cavalry. I woke before any more was revealed. The phrase was nice, it cheered me a little for all its old fashioned-ness. Help is at hand.

She is a woman, apparently. Rumanian. He told me he’d seen her in town. She is just a body in sleep when I see her on the Prom, covered in blankets. She had a red suitcase, he said. I gave her two pounds and she took my hand. I will take her some food tomorrow and a pair of warm socks. I am moved. And my own winter-despairing is overshadowed. Good.

I am struggling. I lay on his bed in the afternoon taking a short rest while he listened to ‘Party’ once again. Whenever I turn to look at him he is invariably chuckling to himself. We both share a liking for returning to familiar things and places. Which is good. It feels like a tunnel. It feels like the clouds in the sky are bearing down on me. I fight to keep going, to keep things normal. I work, I cook, I even baked the second batch of mince pies. I will take her some tomorrow. But it is a Herculean effort. Is it the winter? Or is it something more ominous? I’ve work again today when I wanted to write. But I must do it. It funds this. It funds my way, though this month poorly.

The houses along North Road each had huge bedecked Christmas trees in their windows. At least the ones before the multi-occupant ones at the end did. Opulent trees, bursting with decoration. The house with the huge teddy bears in the windows was a mass of tinsel and gimcrack. OTT but delightful to pass in the dark and rain.

I’ve more notes to make before I can begin to write it. The coffee has been drunk time to start.

There were few people about when I walked, a man hurrying down the Prom carrying a plastic bag from the 24 hour SPAR, the milkman in his van and an ambulance driving into town and then back along Llanbadarn Road. Several lights were still on in Alexandra Hall. Perhaps some students haven’t yet gone home. It is mournful being so alone, but not unpleasant. The wind, an easterly was sharp on my face.

N was amazing. I was abuzz with our conversation. He brought me alive again. I want more of it. Now I must make sense of it all and begin to shape a piece. I always get nervous about writing. Is it the same with everyone? I’ve hoovered and mopped the flat – part displacement and partly to get it over with. Now there is no excuse but to get down to work. The bane of self-employment, it is up to me. Do it. And it will feel better.

I baked mince pies yesterday. Mind you that was before he came home with directions from the diabetes nurse that he needs to cut down on carbohydrates. How do we start doing that? His diet is wholly-based on them. Heigh ho. I shall do my best. Then there is the news that our washing machine may combust at any moment! Lordy. Another batch to bake today. Perhaps I shall give some to the man I saw sleeping in the Prom shelter this morning. And so cold, poor love. May he find comfort.

And S and R. Does he have it? She with her cauliflower nose. I couldn’t help touching her. That brusqueness just a show to hide her concern, her fear of losing him. Her toy boy I called him. He laughed. Bless her, bless them and keep them safe.

He found some. It is hanging in our kitchen-cum-dining-room-cum-living-room. He kissed me under it. May it bring luck, love, abundance and a lifting of my doldrum spirits. And yours, if you too are beset with winter blues. Are you?

I am so grateful for the efforts people go to to decorate their homes at this time of the year. One of the estate agents’ windows that I passed this morning was ablaze with lights. Marvellous, particularly as the Hot Bread Shop next door has subsequently closed and I’m no longer lifted by the smell of the baking dough. The temporary ice rink is also not stinting on the festive lights. The Castle opposite is lit up with a revolving rainbow of pinks, greens and blues. One of the ground floor flats on South Marine had bright white stars stuck to its windows – a little tacky but so cheering. My lights are on in the studio as I wait to make the phone call. I’m nervous. It’s been so long since I wrote. Or so it seems. Breathe – all will be well. And he seems really intriguing. Give me courage, this day and the next and the rest thereafter. Amen.

It was a voice at the end of my dream. A man’s voice, I think. A question. A question that seemed significant. Do you want to come to the gate? it asked. What gate? Was I to see someone off, or was it a gate at the end of a piece of land, a field, or a garden perhaps? Why was it significant? Who can know? Dreams are a mystery, though sometimes they become clearer as the day wears on. I shall sit with it.

The clue was list of ingredients. We couldn’t get it. I’ve since looked it up, and it was ‘formula’. But the really unsettling thing was the handwriting wasn’t mine or his. Someone else had filled some of them. Who? It fits with how I am still feeling. Misaligned, out of kilter. I can’t get myself back. Just keep doing what you are doing, he says. Will it settle then? Will I? Is that a promise?

I also dreamt of a woman baking. She was making some kind of gingerbread. It was from an ancient, familial recipe. She was proud of it. It looked rather like parkin. Can I have the recipe? I asked. What did she answer? It felt important to know.

She wore zebra shoes and she had a bogey up her nose. It was hard to take her seriously. She was confident. A professor. They all came in to watch her at work on my stomach. It’ll leave some big bruises, she said, that will last for about a week. It hasn’t, though the flesh is sore. Do you want to have a look? the male nurse asked him. Then me. It’s a bit like a cross between olive oil and lard, she’d said. It was liquid with tiny yellow and orange globules floating on its surface. It’s not very much, she said, but it should do. It was all about proving a negative, apparently.

I’ve got pastry and mincemeat. I want to do something, to mark it in some way. She said yes, they both did. I am glad, for the longing to see her yesterday was so strong. A bitty day ahead, a clearing up day. They are just as important as the seemingly productive ones. Why doesn’t she respond? Ugh! We are so different. I must be patient, make allowances. Onward.

The skating rink is up. Skating by the sea is the strapline. The castle park is a sparkle with lights. I wish they’d turn the lights on through the town. It’s a money saving exercise, so they are just alight in the early evening. Shame.

There’s power in it. Taking responsibility, that is. Taking full responsibility for what occurs, for what happens. It isn’t easy. To blame is the human condition. To make a victim of oneself is so seductive. Poor me. But it isn’t true. Every step, just like every breath has been chosen and should be lived in the light of that awareness. I was angry. I was angry that the easy way out had been denied me. I have to live instead and work my way through the mire of uncertainty created by my opposing selves. I have so many choices, so many more than I allow myself to believe. And all of it is my own doing. Let me feel the power of that knowledge. For if that is the case then anything is possible.

You don’t have to keep saying you’re sorry, he said. Don’t I? I was unkind. He turns in his chair to face me. It’s OK. Is it? Such ugliness. He wanted me gone. And I don’t blame him.

My dream unsettled me, stirred it all up. I thought of it as I walked, or tried to walk in the wildness of the wind. How it makes everything wail. The rigging in the harbour, The Angel’s pub sign, the telephone wires – all of the them rattling, screaming and clanging. He had a huge life. This man. This man I dreamt of. He was listing all the things he was going to do that night. I wasn’t invited, I could only look in. Then, after he’d told me of it all, he asked, Can’t you be happy for me?

It’s the need for largesse, for expansion, for opportunities to make, to write, to express set against the other need to hide, to take cover, to rest, to be in silence, alone. How can they ever be reconciled?

Enough for now. Tomorrow I will find courage. Today I shall rest. For my body is still sore, still tender from all that invasion, those needle pricks. And then, I shall do my best. I promise.

My body is sore. It has been prodded, pierced, invaded, photographed, enclosed and extracted from. It has been alarmed, shocked and frightened. And for nothing. And we have talked. We have been to the abyss. We have looked at death. We have visited it. I am numb. He is euphoric. At least he was. As they were. I cannot match it. I am numb. Lost. Still lost. It was a narrative I had accepted. I had accepted that my death was near. And now? It isn’t. So be it. I no longer know what you want of me. And my fear made me hurt him. I am ashamed. Deeply so. I need help but from whom. She was so wise, my beautiful love. People don’t want to go into that tunnel with you, she said. No, they don’t. And why should they? Why should she, she who is so vital, so full of vigour and hope? I must accept this, this life and make the best of it. And be kind. Oh, God make me kind. For I have not been so.

I wasn’t sure what to do. It was three am and I’d just come down the little hill towards the station and was cutting through a narrow street of small terraced houses. I saw him in standing in front of one of the front doors, he appeared to be trying to put something through the door. It was almost freezing, (they’d predicted 2 degrees but said that the wind chill would make it feel like 0 degrees) and he was just in a shirt. He had a take-away food carton in his hand. As I got closer I could see that he was actually trying to get a key into the lock. Should I offer to help? I thought, but then wavered. He was clearly drunk, his body swayed as he endeavoured to focus on inserting the key. There was something comical about the intensity of his concentration and his inability to perform such a simple task. Was he even at the correct house? Was he trying to break in, even? If I helped him I might be seen as an accessory. Rubbish, I know but I just didn’t want to get involved. He was silent then but who knows how he would’ve reacted. But, nevertheless, I didn’t like leaving him like that, in the cold. When I turned to check on him he was on his knees still trying to insert the key.

I enjoyed seeing her. I got there early to secure a table. It was busy full of interesting faces. I began a drawing but my subject became aware of me and stopped, my confidence is so brittle these days. I like it in there. It is bustly, the food is cheap and though there’s nothing there I’d eat I still like to be around it’s smells and to see others eating it with relish. Another world, another life. I like the way that it is high up, above the street. She appears so content with herself, her world, life. So young, a few adolescent spots still mark her face. An open face, fresh and typically Scandinavian. We talked of farming, Christmas, baking, alcohol and traditions. I don’t like change, she said and worries what will happen to her family Christmas yuletide rituals when she eventually moves out to be with her boyfriend. We spoke some Norwegian though the wordier explanations were in English. I am trying and I do make myself understood, though I find her accent a little tricky. I’m used to the Oslo way. She ordered a hot chocolate with cream and ate it from the top with a long spoon. She and her family drink coke instead of wine at Christmas. I love it, she says. I’m touched by her willingness to meet me. What does she get out of it? She offered to get some more children’s books for me to read from the library at home. But I’ve asked too much of her already. It’s fine, I said, I can buy them myself from the internet.

The sky is clearing. Time has passed fast this morning. Coffee, sewing, yoga, lunch then packing. Breathe. And the first advent candle. The advent calendar is installed and the first door opened. I shall miss them both next week but to get away…..

It is too much to hold in one’s head. The terror of it all. I don’t turn my face away from it but choose instead to concentrate on the small instead of the large. I honour their bravery at taking him on, and I send love to the families of the bereaved. I ask him if it puts him off wanting to go to London again. He says no. I’m glad. Me neither. It is chance in the end. And no place is worse than another, I suppose. There is danger and the possibilities of joy everywhere. But the focus here, where I live, is smaller, more pedestrian. Like the lights being switched on and the Lantern Parade and the fact that this is the last day for the Hot Bread Shop. I used to go in there sometimes to buy him a sandwich. It’s not a posh bakery. Simple. For a town with simple tastes. The usual stuff, loaves of bread, sliced or unsliced, rolls, iced buns, tarts, biscuits, and made-to-order sandwiches. The windows are always steamed up. The staff wear bright blue hair nets. And sometimes when he is feeling hypo he nips in for a chelsea bun. Not anymore. Not after today. It’ll have to be Slater’s. And there is always the Pelican. I hope they last. The smell of baking bread sustains me on my walk. That is the heart of the town, not the students.

She was chatty yesterday, full of life. It was probably the sun. She’s doing so well. First the Christmas Dinner and then the gathering in Aberaeron. Small victories but evidence of huge courage. Just to walk in alone and navigate where to sit, whom to talk to and so on. Huge courage. And she has it. I am so proud of her. What a long was she has come in the seven years we’ve been talking together.

A gentle day.