So soon we're too old to carry...

This is a fine song by the Maccabees (here are the lyrics). I've posted this particular link to the video, as it has no adverts. It makes S melt. A bit like the John Lewis advert from a couple of years ago for me that shows a baby girl growing older (though the Maccabees does elicit similar feelings). And yes, I know it's sad to be moved by an advert, but there you go. 

However, this beauty is in a different league. I struggle to get through it: 

When you are old and grey and full of sleep,

And nodding by the fire, take down this book,

And slowly read, and dream of the soft look

Your eyes had once, and of their shadows deep;

How many loved your moments of glad grace,

And loved your beauty with love false or true,

But one man loved the pilgrim soul in you,

And loved the sorrows of your changing face;

And bending down beside the glowing bars,

Murmur, a little sadly, how Love fled

And paced upon the mountains overhead

And hid his face amid a crowd of stars.

William Butler Yeats

Now, then

I'm reading a book based on memory (SJ Watson's brilliant debut, Before I Go To Sleep) and wondering what life would be like without the capacity to recall one's history (a theme that I think is covered in Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, which I haven't seen yet). There are things I suspect I would (should?) like to forget – things that I had in fact blocked out for a while – but if I did properly erase all of that stuff, would I be doomed to repeat mistakes and wonder why it was I feel X about Y? 

The clincher for me would be the lack of being able to experience the warm glow – and sadness – that comes with nostalgia, something that I am wont to feel with a vividness that can knock my breath from me. There are places that are so evocative that just being there is time travel. The old, the gone, the usually-forgotten, spring back into life if I mentally or physically 'go back', and I can be 5, 10, 15, 20, 25, 35 years younger, in the switch of a synapse. It happened several months ago, as I walked near a place in which I had worked during my late 20s and 30s. Everything seemed to rush back, a waterfall of memories and feelings, wonderful and wretched. A lump formed in my throat as the trees, pavements and some of the still-standing businesses, bars and shops wove a silent web around me and threw me hurtling back to when my life was something entirely different. Time didn't stand still; it came back on itself, looping so unexpectedly by making me relive situations and conversations that I was taken aback. How did I get here from there? I still wonder. When recalling the not-so-good times, it's not triumph over adversity that I feel, but a sense of cautious relief.
Visiting my childhood home also gave me a powerful burst of nostalgia. I clearly recall the 70s wallpaper (most people would find it unforgettable, to be fair); the paint better suited to a curry spice kit than walls, the sunlight streaming into the front room, the relative darkness of the back. The thud of a tennis ball against a wall, a large orange Spacehopper bouncing on the hard ground, a slippery paddling pool, a Wendy house where I secretly gorged on soft brown sugar (don't ask), a 'blue moon' rose bush my parents sourced for my birthday, a light grey trim phone, the sound of the early morning milk float, two deliveries of post before noon, a serving hatch, an Austin Allegro (apple green), a beautiful ginger cat who grew with me and made me cry for months when his mouth swelled with a tumour; the huge radiogram with its SW, LW, MW and possibly FM wavebands... The ability to keep facts and conversations in my head, when now I have to stop and calculate to know what day it is and how old I am. That kind of thing.

The childhood house has changed beyond recognition; the saddest sight for me was seeing that the previously tenderly-kept front garden, home to the beautiful blue rose bush and myriad flowers and shrubs, had a new lease of life, if you can call it that, as a dirty concrete driveway. The house was an unkempt mess. The road was littered. I have mentioned this in another post, so won't repeat it. Nostalgia, in that case, was replaced by intense disappointment and sadness, plus a measure of anger. 
There are many songs written about the past, about fond memories and regret (notably the one written by Trent Reznor of Nine Inch Nails, covered so poignantly by Johnny Cash, as per my post on March 6)... It's Cash's delivery – the fact he is talking about himself, his life, albeit through someone else's words – that gives it such intensity. Without his memories, the song would be just lyrics; the video, showing him at his prime and as a frail dying man, would be just pictures. Instead, it grabs the listener/viewer with its stunning rawness. Long live nostalgia. I'm certain it helps to make us – and keep us – human.

Shiver

This is not a good song to drive to (it was on the radio yesterday as I sat behind the wheel, and, yes, the car was moving). Did you know that if you type "hurt" into Google, the top hit is this:

William and Catherine, and all that

They tied the knot on April 29, 2011, sparking many a street party

I feel I should write something about the wedding of Prince William to Catherine Middleton. If I had written a post about it a few weeks ago, I'd have peppered it with more than a touch of cynicism, forcing an attempt to make myself take note, in the interests of being a journalist and an observer of life as we know it. But as the day approached, like a slow-moving tsunami, my excitement grew, my patriotism soared, my love of romance made my heart beat faster and my fondness of this country, with its amazing history, brilliant eccentricity and strange weather, rocketed.

I was up early on the big day with my little one; her dad was playing cricket somewhere in Sussex. She stood in front of the television as William and Kate exchanged vows and rings, wondering why Mama had a sudden, and unexpected, tear in her eye and spoke a little strangely, due to the lump in her throat. I don't know why, but I was moved by the ceremony and by the hopeful faces. I was surprised that I cared. Perhaps it was the cumulative goodwill. Perhaps it was witnessing history. Perhaps I am just an old romantic fool.

I told my little girl that the man in scarlet uniform would be king one day, and that, in all likelihood, her generation would see at least three monarchs, if not four, in its members' lifetimes. She listened, carried on playing with her yellow and red plastic toy giraffe and again stood between me and the television talking to me in toddler-speak, but I nevertheless caught the main bits and pieces of the proceedings.

Later, we went for a walk and passed several street parties in full swing. The fluttering of Union flags, bunting, and the sound of chatting and laughter were wonderful. Something that could elicit so much positivity, and (republicans aside) be devoid of the cynicism that taints just about everything else we encounter these days, can surely only be a good thing...

The new Duchess of Cambridge

Journeywoman

Due to developing an illness that affects one in 300 women, or something like that, I was told I should consider having what purists might term an unnatural birth. The baby was at risk, and so was I. So, her birthday was brought forward and I was booked in for the first operation I have had, bar dental surgery. I was so tired, so very exhausted by weeks of illness and not being able to sleep due to the Woman Next Door (WND)'s bloody noisy, ongoing building work (another story)... But there I was, with S, on the early morning of motherhood, nervous as hell and looking pretty unpretty, my skin dull and blotchy. The place was spotless, utterly clinical. My surgeon and the anaesthetist had warned me of all the complications, which included death, so I was suitably shaken.

The obstetrician sliced through my abdominal muscles instead of parting them (as is normal with most Caesarean sections), as my years of kung fu had rendered my stomach muscles 'so tight!' that the team couldn't stretch them. A compliment, at any rate, and one that made me smile as I waited in fear/hope/excitement as my insides were tugged and pulled with immense force. I had imagined that during a Caesarean section the baby was always lifted out calmly, gently, peacefully... but the fact is they try – where possible – to give the baby something akin to the experience of birth. In reality, they push the little being from its warm cocoon through the incision and out into the brightly-lit, impeccably clean theatre with its white walls, scrubbed and greened theatre team, metal implements and an absolutely massive digital clock on the wall, (which had stared back at me as a spinal tap was inserted).

After this part – the 'spinal', as it's called by some – I lay down as the powerful anaesthetic coursed through my body, deadening my nerves. They sprayed an icy cold substance up and down my sides to determine where sensation began and ended, a process that was repeated until the correct vertebral markers were numb. It was a staggeringly quick process and one that added surreality to that which any new parent must feel. One minute there's no child. And the next? "Meet your daughter," as this tiny person is held above the blue cloth they pin up to stop the mother and birth partner (S, in my case) seeing the gory business. Afterwards, I asked S what he could manage to see, and he said: "just lots of blood". I recall hearing the words: scalpel, knife, suction, gutters... and forced S, at the time, to tell me in great detail about his week at work. Also nervous, he got through this quickly and moved on to a ghost story. I think. I was terrified. My hands were clammy, my brow sweated and the oft-repeated warnings of what might happen to me and the baby rang in my ears. A Caesarean is not an easy way out. To believe so is incredibly stupid. What kind of fool would choose a major abdominal operation with a higher mortality rate than the other option?

The birth itself involved so much pressure being applied to my chest that I suffered excruciating pain in my upper back once we got home – and at one point screamed for an ambulance, as I (really) thought I was about to die of a heart attack. But it's not uncommon, this pain. This squeeze out of the womb helps the baby to do what it would do naturally – take a breath and cry to clear its lungs to begin its life independent of the umbilical cord. I cannot begin to describe the feeling I had at that moment. It was out of this world for its sheer uniqueness. My life, at a stroke – in the beat of a tiny heart – had changed irrevocably. I had taken a fork in the road that would lead us to life anew.
The scar is still numb. I couldn't touch it for weeks after the dressing had been removed, and then, only tentatively, peeking at it shyly as though it might open and reveal my shiny, scarlet innards. It's neat, about six inches across (having shrunk from nine) and sits beneath where I might wear a bikini if I chose to do so. Neat work by the startlingly young-looking surgeon who performed the operation. The skin is looser than it was before and, while I was back into my favourite fitted jeans fairly quickly, there is more sag, more excess, more softness. As my abs were cut open, it's unlikely I'll regain my muscle tone of old. I don't worry about these things. I don't diet. I do my best to exercise (a little). But flat tummy or not, my scar will always remind me of all of the above and more: of where I was and where I am now. It is the best kind of body art. No Chinese saying, no Inca symbol, no bird or butterfly could mean more.

Let's just act as though I've been here all along...

Hmmm. Why start with all that "why is it February 2011?" stuff? What's the point? Time will fly and the alternative is that we die, so let's just accept it. Thank you for being here and listening. If you are an old friend, a reader who kept pace with me for the past few years (bar the last), I apologise. My thoughts have flicked to this blog and flicked just as quickly away. But I always hoped to one day remember the password and get cracking again.

So, I've been standing in the room all along, a little quietly, observing and listening. Cocking my head for the sounds that envelope my being in this new world where I am me, but I am also another's in a way that I have never been another's. My time is shaped differently. It's sometimes replete with exhaustion (though this sensation is far less than it was a year ago). Time is also lit up with the sparkling, tingling, stunning newness that can only come with spending time with a mind that is yet so unfocused but so interested that it picks on just about anything to hang its hat on. A dog. A leaf. A face. A smile. A bird. Music. Books. These things become fascinating for me anew and I could cry with delight. I remember, feel, how much I enjoy music, how it lifts me from the doldrums or lets me drown in its catharsis. I love walking with no agenda, seeing the trees go through their cycle and life spring up. The winter sunshine invigorates me. I have hardly any money. But I have all of these other things. And I see them reflected back in similar eyes to mine. And the responsibility and wonder hits me again.
If it's not too late to say it: Happy 2011.

Erm, it's May...

Please, someone, tell me how it's May. It's mid-May at that.

Sorry I haven't been on here much – and apologies to those who left me messages and comments that have gone unnoticed until today. You know who you are and I send you good vibes and thanks for not giving up on me.

I sort of don't know where to start. I mean, do I start by writing a huge post that will no doubt take hours and yet fail to convey the reality of life in the past few months? Er, I don't know. One thing that made me think of this blog was my brain-wracking last night as I tried to recall a very rude Finnish word... It has just come back to me and I shall be using it where appropriate.

But anyway.

A summary to begin with, to ease me back into cyberland and blogdom... I hope you will forgive me for being a tad lazy about this.

Sleep – this has not been as bad, or as scant, as one might expect. I am lucky to have such a laid-back and clever bairn, who knows how much mummy values shut-eye. However, baby's teething does cause her discomfort and breaks up her kip at times. Five night in a row is tough. I sometimes feel so tired I cannot move. But she is worth all of it.

House – I am now living in a house, not a flat. It is a tiny house, a Victorian cottage, but there is no GFG, no door slamming from below! Hurrah. However, the woman next door (WND) refuses to remove her stilettos and plods around her wooden floors like a shire horse on stilts. She's a right moody cow with a face like a smacked arse most of the time, but that's for another day. The woman on the other side is, happily, fab.

Work – I have done only a few days' work, as I am on maternity leave. I am pretty broke but now realise how much I frittered in the past. I think my attitude to cash has changed permanently. When I think of how much I/we used to spend on what is, basically crap, I shudder.

Kung fu – this is back on the agenda. I ache like a bastard at times after class, but it's fantastic to be exercising again and to be back in the swing of things. I'm even sparring and fighting blokes twice my size and half my age. Slightly demented, but it's good fun (most of the time).

Motherhood (last but not least, obv) – the most amazing experience. Ne plus ultra. Quite surreal at times. Exhausting. Exhilarating. Energising. Educational. Wouldn't change it for the world.

Happy New Year!

First, a very Happy New Year to those who follow this blog/remember me/have stumbled upon me!! I'm sorry I have been so tardy and so lax in my blogging but I have been going through some major life adjustments that have rendered me sleepless, time-free and exhausted, but very happy...

My baby was born early, in September, as I was ill. I had to have a Caesarean, which was certainly not the easy-peasy option. Why anyone would wish to have their innards sliced and suchlike, is beyond me, but I had the operation on medical grounds, more of which I will write about in a subsequent post for anyone who likes that sort of thing. All I will say is that being given paracetamol instead of morphine/codeine afterwards was not funny...

Anyway, I just wanted to say that I hope you had great Christmas times and also wished to wish you all a very wonderful 2010 and let you know that I will be back blogging between mummy duties. Baby's well, she's a little sweetheart (OK, yes, biased, cetra...). I will write more soon. Not just about my little girl, but other stuff, too...

The disappeared

It's funny – peculiar, not haha – how people come and go from one's life. I didn't really expect to lose friends, or to have them drift, just because I am expecting a baby. But it has happened. I can try to understand the reasons but part of me is pretty annoyed about their selfishness.

I am not the sort of person to talk about one topic endlessly (i.e. impending motherhood). Never have been. It's insulting that some people seem to be unable to deal with events in my life and I am certainly not going to apologise for getting on with things. OK, so I have less time and far less energy to blog, go out and entertain. But c'est la vie. It doesn't mean I've turned into a bloody cabbage. I've seemingly been struck off a couple of people's friend lists and even blog lists. Not what I expected, but hey, it seems that if I can't go out and drink/stay out late, or X, Y or Z (and then write about it), well, that's that.

Well, bollocks to it. I am heartily sick of being a silent, understanding, doormat-type psychiatrist for those who apply my life events to their own, find some huge relevance and threat, and cannot step back from whatever crappage may be behind their 'distance'. I'm fed-up with sending emails filled with questions and interest in the other person that elicit lukewarm shite. I'm fed-up with my invitations to meet being batted away with "I'm busy/ill/broke" etc. We're all fucking busy, feel sick at times and have no cash. I'm fed-up with making allowances for this and that. Enough.

Things are not all bad on the people front, though. Far from it. My faith in 99.9 per cent of people I care for remains, as ever, strong – stronger, even. And the kindness of someone I'd lost touch with has taken me by surprise. It's a funny old world.


----------------
Listening to: Talk Talk - Life's What You Make It

Fab 40

I celebrate my 40th birthday this coming week.

Flipping heck.

Am not really hung up on the 'Oh, I'm old' lark, being an eternal child, but I recall little things, such as thinking, at the age of six, how ancient 12-year-olds were. And when I was about 12, I thought our 23-year-old teacher was an old bag (well, she was, but that was more about her personality defects)...

So, anyway, what with the bump growing and that, my plans to have a raucous, drunken affair are now put on hold until the next big one (or a Lotto win). Instead, and I am really looking forward to this, we are having a long lunch by the river in a lovely place. People will surely marvel at just how mature and sophisticated I have become, as I sip elderflower cordial. But seriously, I don't mind about the 40 or the sobriety. I feel very blessed, for many reasons, and those reasons – all people I love (including my new unborn one) – are priceless. Spending time with them over the next few days will be the best present.

A quickie

Been absolutely ages since I have been on here... I almost forgot my login details. But, anyway, hello. I am here, just to say hello and to plead excuses as to why I haven't blogged for such a long time. In a nutshell:

Morning sickness (that went on all day)
Moving house (this was a saga; I was coordinating the move, God knows what the estate agents were getting a fat fee for, the buggers)
Sorting out house (this is still ongoing)
Feeling really, really tired (I have a bump to carry around now - it isn't huge (people say) but I've put on an eighth of my body weight (entirely normal))
No internet access (well, apart from at my parents' home)
Work's been rubbish - there's hardly any to be had - but thank God I don't have to commute for three hours a day. Blessings disguised, I tell you...

And that's about that really. Me, the four-plus-hours-of-kung-fu-a-week girl, can barely get up the stairs without needing a sit down. I've started yoga and t'ai chi, though, and go for walks, too. This to me is pretty strenuous stuff.

Anyway, I shall update again and include more detail. I will try.

Ducking the ducks

Well, we didn't really duck the ducks (or the geese), but they were very funny company as S and I sat by a lovely lake today. The sun shone and we lazed on a blanket all afternoon, as our feathered friends strutted around eyeing us for bits of our picnic. They were partial to M&S bacon rasher crisps and even pecked at pieces of jalapeno chili tortilla chips, which worried me slightly.

As we lay back, we listened to snatches of conversations from the passersby who would occasionally stop and sit on a nearby bench, their words carried to us on the gentle breeze. It was a lovely, lovely day. Just the thing to follow our hectic day of packing boxes yesterday in preparation for our home move.

My pregnant pause

I am expecting a baby in October: very exciting, scary, exciting, scary and erm, exciting and scary...

The day I found out was the same day I was told I'd lost my job (no notice, as I am self-employed). Two weeks before that, we secured an offer on our flat despite it not being on the market (we'd tried to sell it unsuccessfully for about a year in 2007-08)... Then we found a place to move to (due to happen in the next few weeks).

To say the past few months has been a whirlwind is an understatement. I've suffered (and am suffering) dreadful sickness but I'm told that this will "just go one day". I can't even open the fridge beyond 5pm. Thinking about it now is actually making me retch. My sense of smell would rival a bloodhound's.

Crazy stuff. All amazing, but crazy (in a good way).

Surrealism

I haven't been blogging much of late but that's because I'm having a rather strange time. Some strange-good, some not-so-good, some just plain old good and some not good.

I realise that that doesn't explain anything. I'll explain when I find words that are clear enough. Not sure when that'll be, but it'll be.

January...

...where did you go? Eh? How can it be February on Sunday?

When I got up this morning, I was surprised at the pale pinkish light in the sky. I wondered momentarily what was wrong then realised I was witnessing sunrise.

Tempus...

This blog will be two on January 15th. How did that happen?

The past two years have been a blur of sleeplessness, sleep, rabbits, rabbit, no rabbit... noise, quiet, overwork, underwork, couch potato-ism, kung fu fighting, anger, and peace of mind, too.

I wish to build on my peace of mind. This is the basis of sanity. It works well with sleep and makes the other things on my list manageable. And I am striving to have a PMA where possible. These things help to minimise the effects of life's variables.

I hope 2009 is being good to you so far.

RIP my sweetest friend

M died today, suddenly following a bout of gastro-intestinal stasis (GI stasis). The onset was shockingly quick. It is all surreal. Part of the reason I am blogging this is to pay tribute to a small dearly-loved friend who was a daily companion with whom I spent more time than any other living thing in the past few years. She was a present from my dear S, who has now come home early from a visit to his mum. M was his first pet and she loved him and he did her.

To have a 'wild' animal sitting by you on a sofa, giving you kisses, snuggling, sitting on your feet as you work (how will I work without her with me? She saved me from loneliness many a time...), resting her paw on your hand (as she did for the first time on her last night with me) is an amazing experience borne of trust. She was clever, bright, fun, sweet, gentle, absolutely beautiful, literally softer than silk, loyal and a blessed spirit-fairy-like lapin. I loved her immensely. We both did.



The other reason for me to blog is this: if anyone is Googling GI stasis or anything along the lines of a rabbit not eating or passing waste matter, take my advice and see a vet immediately. I did as soon as it was apparent that M was unwell (she missed an evening meal and I thought she might have some in the night but she had gone into shock by morning)... her decline was extremely quick, as is the way with rabbits.

I really cannot believe it... she was bouncing around at Christmas and lying next to me on the Saturday evening. I took her to hospital Sunday morning after noting she had not touched her evening food. She died at 9.45am today.

I am suspended somewhere else in the land of 'It's a lie'. She was just three-and-a-half and had otherwise been healthy and active.

I will miss her beyond words.

Flying south

Swallows, calling to each other, have just flown over my corner of London, no doubt going south. I wonder if they will end up near the Canada Geese that took off last night, making noises I have never previously heard. The sky was dark and the air was bitingly cold, as they communicated in a warbling, eerie pitch.

Today, the sun shone for a while but is now hidden behind pale bluey-grey haze. It feels like winter.

White rabbits

Happy August, all! White rabbits! (Meant to bring luck, I believe, if it is the first thing you say in the month, goodness knows why...)

And here is my sweet black rabbit, M, just to confuse matters. She has milk chocolate patches all over her lower body, which you can see when the sun shines on her:

Bits of my day

• The hairy arms of the person next to me on the tube tickling my bare ones. Yuk. Stay in your own space! Gaaaah!
  
• Chuggers. Just chuggers. Who are these people who stop for them? It's good in summer as you can wear sunglasses and zone them out completely. They rely on eye contact (and stepping out in front of you).
  
• Estate agents asking for your requirements for the 100th time. It is not a good sales technique.
  
• PR people lying. Hmm. Yes.
• Being casually offered a full-time job that I casually refused (politely). Flattering, though.
  
• Feeling my chest tighten for the third day running. It's extremely humid at the moment – perhaps this was the cause. I thought I would collapse with the heat on the Tube home, though. Luckily, I unearthed an old asthma inhaler with the date '2006' on it. I am seeing the doctor on Monday.
  
• S texting me four times – and them arriving at once despite being written across the span over an hour. He said eating alone was a lonely experience – he's in Edinburgh, hundreds of miles away. He sounded so forlorn. I know S will come back with many tales of japes from the Festival. I recall being in The Witchery when I was 31, looking up at the tarot cards etched into the ceiling, a boulder in my belly as I pretended to enjoy the delicious food. I felt so lost as I drank the deep, dark wine. But the cards above my head were full of promise.
  
• Spending a pleasant evening with some members of my kung fu club in the pub – they are a really nice bunch of people. I like that they are so different but that we have our martial art in common. I'd like to learn the stories of some of them; I think we all have reasons for doing a martial art.
  
• M, the rabbit has stuck close by. She hasn't had much company today. I gave her extra leaves and broccoli to compensate a little.