Living with a puppy is a little like having a baby again. They want to play constantly, they look at you as a source of entertainment and food, and need to be taken out often to learn not to soil indoors (dog-nappy, anyone?). It’s also a good idea to lift everything up high because puppies like to chew… and I knew that, I’ve had a puppy before… but I had forgotten quite ‘how much’ they chew… indiscriminately… tea-towels, tassels and socks, cushions, shoes, ankles. Plastic tubs, sticks, leaves, baskets. Fingers, trousers legs, their own tail.
Half way through sewing this the pedal of my sewing machine got chewed right through, I could have sworn he was on the other side of the room the just a split second earlier…
I was trying to make the backing for a beautiful sashiko sampler cloth that mum had embroidered in order to turn it into a table runner type thing. My brother, a missionary in South Sudan, wants it for the altar in their church. The African fabric came from three shirts that were donated to my boys when they were little. So cute.
I love the contrast between the Japanese front and the South Sudanese fabric in the back. The rich, contrasting colour looks great together too.
Luckily for me we had an electrician doing some work in the garden and he managed to temporarily fix the cable for me.
Next job? Face masks… they’re finally becoming compulsory in shops in 10 days’ time and I need to get sewing!
Yep still counting, it’s slightly dramatic but it helps me remember there was a before and now there is now.
Let’s talk about walking. Do you like it? I had forgotten how much I do like it actually and I feel very foolish thinking about the years I’ve wasted (I tried running on many an occasion, but I feel those days are behind me now… I get quite bored, there, I said it. And i know it’s not cool to say it, the ‘lockdown’ seems to have turned everyone into a runner… but me? I’ve always like doing the opposite. Also, running when it’s cold it’s not fun at all, trust me. So now I walk. And you have the time to see so much more when walking. And think. You have time to think, or not to think, and listen to music or podcasts, or audio books. But mostly I like the silence and the noise of what’s around me, I like the rhythm of the steps, I like the smile and shy ‘good morning’ when you meet some one else out like you before the world is awake.
At first, I walked to get out of the house on the allowed ‘one exercise’ a day (as if normal people would do more??), and find some space that was mine alone. (Mine and all the other lycra clad new-joggers… cabin fever is and was real, people!)… Then I began walking to explore the streets around where we live, and believe me when I tell you I walked them all. Frankly, who knew that urban streets could be so interesting? I could be a taxi driver, or a local guide: I discovered lanes, and back streets, shortcuts and dead ends. I discovered cool graffitis, interesting architecture, little brooks and hidden parks. New houses, old houses, bike lanes, underpasses, disused railways lines. And then… I bought a couple of books and realised there is literally a whole world out there waiting to be explored within a few miles radius… after all, everything is walking distance if you have the time.
I walked alone and I walked with friends, with the boys and with family.
I bought a new rucksack, one with lots of strange pockets and hooks and a chest strap and a waist strap. I’m considering walking poles (which I used years ago on the Dolomites and I know they really help)… but don’t tell the boys just yet.
I bought books and walking guides.
I’m anxiously waiting for the puppy to be able to come with me (it’ll be months… sigh).
This morning, the husband and I left the boys (and a friend, a girlfriend and two dogs) and went for a walk around Bourton-on-the-Water. We were following one of the routes in this book:
which is brilliant and I highly recommend it, the directions are clear and the maps make sense.
We left the village and immediately we were in a different world. The path took us along the many carp lakes and the sun shimmering on the water was so welcoming and calming…
For quite a while we strolled along the river Windrush… small river, slow flowing, shallow and crystal clear…
… through copses, and woodlands, amongst flowers and hundreds of butterflies… through fields of freshly mowed hay and bright green wheat…
It was a five mile circular walk back to the town and there may have been an impromptu fish and chips for lunch… maybe… I’m not saying… what goes on tour stays on tour…
As a sentence it sounds a little like the beginning of your stereotypical post apocalypse novel, and I haven’t decided if its veracity is chilling or merely something to shrug off. There’s a lot of talk about the ‘new normal’, of how the ‘old normal’ wasn’t functioning… well let me tell you… I hate that word: normal. What does that even mean? Is it the the voice of the majority? It doesn’t make it right…. Is it what’s comfortable or ‘working’?… that doesn’t mean it’s ok for everyone and should be maintained… I don’t know. It’s too too much for my head.
How are you all? How have you been?
Me? mmhm, a lot of good days, some very bad days and every shade in between. On the bad days I’m thinking… what if this is ‘it’? The beginning of the end, a slow unravelling of the world as we know it, not an end in fire or ice… but a an unstoppable trickle, a tiny leak in the universe that we have built for centuries… ok it’s not that we had created something flawless, but it had its good points you’ll have to agree. On the good days I looked around at my family and felt grateful and full of love. Other times, I put the head down and waited for a new morning.
There were days spent on online lessons, and college assignments were handed in, though I missed sitting in the soft quietness of the library. Lots of books were read chosen from ‘the pile’ or ordered online, though I missed the hushed atmosphere of a bookshop and real letters were written on real paper with real pens, though I missed to see friends face to face.
We cancelled holidays, and that hurts, it still does. I’m so lucky to live where I live, and yes, I am lucky I had holiday to cancel I guess, but the horizon around me has gone smaller and I find it difficult to accept it.
I discovered walking and I truly believe that kept me sane.
I baked sourdough. Twice. Just to say I’ve done it.
We had family movie nights when we took turn to choose … I’m proud to say I survived ‘The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy’ AND ‘Fast and Furious, Tokyo Drift’… my revenge to the boys was ‘The Two Popes’. They’re not the only ones who can play that game!
I’m also not going into long explanations of why it didn’t feel right to be here… it just didn’t, and maybe the end is near for this little blog of mine after 14 years, or maybe not.
Oh… and we have a puppy. And he’s the best. And you’ll see a lot more of him!
One good thing about this enforced home stay is that even the mending pile, suddenly offers some welcome relief from the monotony of the daily routine. We’re doing ok, we have room to disperse and not be in each other’s pockets unless we want to but even so the ‘openendness’ of the whole affair can drive you crazy if you let it.
Better to keep busy.
So, mending pile… the dressing gown with the seam coming apart? Done. The pyjama top with the ripped button hole and lost button? Fixed. The tracksuit bottom with the broken zip? Good as new.
It didn’t even take that long, just a bit of faffing with different threads and the sewing machine… and then how about fishing off the two sashiko mat that have been languishing on a shelf since last year. At least. Might have been longer. Who’s counting? Time has no meaning at the moment… it’s been suspended… we’re living in a Winnie The Pooh type reality… never mind Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday, Sunday… it’s today… it’s always TODAY… aaaanyway…
Ta daaaaaahhhhhh! Drum roll.
Cute eh? So cute that I’ve decided to start another one because if we unbalance too much the fragile equilibrium between finished projects and unfinished projects… well, who knows what would happen to the world, and let’s face it… we’re in trouble enough as it is!
And a big pat on the back to me!
I might as well begin another one… it’s not that I have to be somewhere else, right?
Not what I would normally read BUT I am a firm believer that sometimes books choose you and happen to appear at the right time with the right message and this one did exactly that.
Of course, before you all get worried, I’m not going to move to Ireland and start farming cows and sheep… but reading this book while ‘on lockdown’, while the world as we know is changed, probably forever, I found it soothing. Reading about a life dictated by the rhythms of the seasons and practical needs of looking after animals was grounding and brought my attention back to the basics. Also, it’s terrible hard work, I mean I ‘knew’ it was… but it really is.
So what my holidays have been cancelled, right? Priorities, please.
This is a lovely, well written book, with chapters about the hard work required, not romanticised in a silly ‘it’s a good life’ way, alternating with chapters about the history of cows – who knew they had such a varied and important history. Written in the first person, it tells the story of the year the author spent back home in Ireland working on the family farm. It’s about family relationships, and it’s about Ireland too, about a sense of place that roots you and draws you in, of belonging to people and history and the pure geography of the landscape. I love that.
Have you seen this letter doing the rounds online?
Dearest Rosemary,
It was a limpid dreary day, hung as in a basket from a single dull star. I thank you for your letter. Outside, I perceive what may be a collection of fallen leaves tussling against a trash can. It rings like jazz to my ears. The streets are that empty. It seems as though the bulk of the city has retreated to their quarters, rightfully so. At this time, it seems very poignant to avoid all public spaces. Even the bars, as I told Hemingway, but to that he punched me in the stomach, to which I asked if he had washed his hands. He hadn’t. He is much the denier, that one. Why, he considers the virus to be just influenza. I’m curious of his sources.
The officials have alerted us to ensure we have a month’s worth of necessities. Zelda and I have stocked up on red wine, whiskey, rum, vermouth, absinthe, white wine, sherry, gin, and lord, if we need it, brandy. Please pray for us.
You should see the square, oh, it is terrible. I weep for the damned eventualities this future brings. The long afternoons rolling forward slowly on the ever-slick bottomless highball. Z. says it’s no excuse to drink, but I just can’t seem to steady my hand. In the distance, from my brooding perch, the shoreline is cloaked in a dull haze where I can discern an unremitting penance that has been heading this way for a long, long while. And yet, amongst the cracked cloudline of an evening’s cast, I focus on a single strain of light, calling me forth to believe in a better morrow.
Faithfully yours,
F. Scott Fitzgerald
… Isn’t it great? Well it’s a fake. I KNOWWWW, very disappointing… I quote from an article on The Independent newspaper today:
The text, which has been shared by many who believe it to be authentic, is in fact a parody letter by Nick Farriella, a writer for humour websiteMcSweeney’s.
I can hardly take any credit for these… I simply followed the fail proof, fool proof recipe and voila’.
Day 5. It’s Saturday so no school, work and kind of free for all/no need to get dressed king of day, but mother’s guilt is a powerful thing so there I was, baking. I’d like a medal please.
Frankly, it was worthy it. These are totes delish.
The recipe is the one on the back of the choc chips package… I have a vague recollection of an episode of friends with Phoebe talking about her grandma’s special recipe which turned out to be this one… but maybe I’m mistaken, it’s been a while since that aired on tv. I bought the chips on amazon, just in case you’re wondering, I can’t find them in the shops here in England.
The boys have already halved the qty that came out of the oven. We took some to the boy who lives opposite us and some to my dad, because we are nice like that.
Ok, day 4 of the lockdown. Isolation is weird, especially because I was more isolated before when everybody went to school and the office and I had the house for myself for hours on end during the day. As a matter of fact I crave isolation at the moment! We’re lucky we live in a big house and we can choose not to see each other but there’s music playing from every room, and people walking about and people demanding food/eating/watching tv… It’s noisy. And I like silence.
I went for a walk yesterday afternoon – Boris said we can leave the house once a day for exercise, so I downloaded a couple of podcasts and off I went.
Bliss.
The weather was perfect, not a cloud in the sky, mild temperatures and nobody about. The odd walker like me, a nod to each other from a distance, polite road crossing in order not pass too close to one another. The city seemed in a state of suspended animation, like an empty movie set in between takes.
And it’s amazing what you notice when you start slowing down and ‘seeing’…
Maybe, at the end of this, the lesson will be to slow down, to look up and look down and notice the beauty that surrounds us, or the ugliness so we can fix it, and appreciate the minutiae and the serendipitous. Maybe we’ll remember to walk down the little lanes at the back of houses, to take the long walk home for the simple pleasure of enjoying the fresh air and the sun on our face.
The weight of the world is love. Under the burden of solitude, under the burden of dissatisfaction
the weight, the weight we carry is love.
Who can deny? In dreams it touches the body, in thought constructs a miracle, in imagination anguishes till born in human-- looks out of the heart burning with purity-- for the burden of life is love,
but we carry the weight wearily, and so must rest in the arms of love at last, must rest in the arms of love.
No rest without love, no sleep without dreams of love-- be mad or chill obsessed with angels or machines, the final wish is love --cannot be bitter, cannot deny, cannot withhold if denied:
the weight is too heavy
--must give for no return as thought is given in solitude in all the excellence of its excess.
The warm bodies shine together in the darkness, the hand moves to the center of the flesh, the skin trembles in happiness and the soul comes joyful to the eye--
yes, yes, that's what I wanted, I always wanted, I always wanted, to return to the body where I was born.
while you're ahead... 