I am just home again after a big travel to the city for an annual cancer check. I was anxious, not about the check, no, but about the thrust of me into a chaos of too many people, the train station thing, the push, the rush, the not feeling sure about connections, the dizzy of bright boards telling me this/that and the very sure possibility of me, little me, having to negotiate a change. I felt even smaller than small as I walked (purposefully) onto one of so many platforms and into a crowd of those who, it seemed to me, knew exactly what they were doing, easy in their waiting. I was cold and unsure, hesitant. This is not me, but it was me in that environment. The journey was 0k, standing all the way and wondering, as a million people travelled with me, if I would ever arrive at Waverley Station. I remember a young mother with three toddlers and a great many men who felt fine taking up all the seats. I thought of my boys and just knew they would have been on it, vacating seats and helping such as this young mum with smiles and assistance. They would have Noticed. It smiled me as my legs fought to stay upholding me. I remembered a young woman, too, dressed for a night out, who reached for me, said, you go before me, as the throng pushed to ‘alight’ and I thank her.

My time with family was glorious. To be welcomed into a young family is not a given, not in the way I was welcomed. Young girls, all teenage and angsty, all soft and loving, loads of crashes, soundus eruptus, then gentle mellow, new puppy in the mix, who does this, who didn’t do that. I sort of remember it, but it was so long ago. Every time I am in the thrix of it, I am initially startled, until I find my feets. Ah, here we are, and then the memories quicken like fire in my mind. I have obviously lived the alone-ness for a long time. But sitting, as I did whilst staying there, outside, alone, watching the big sky over the East Coast and thinking, I can see how it is. I don’t understand it, the now of now, but I see it and here’s the thing……I can flap it away or I can knock on the door. I did. I respect personal space, even if it never existed in my youth. Come in, she said, and I did. There she was, they were, in their private safety. I just came to say goodbye for now. She rises and hugs me like I was so valuable.

I can see what my young are going through even though I am a million miles away from helping any of them. All I would say is this. There’s no point sniffing because it will keep coming until you blow. The katabatic wind is gravity driven, comes down from mountains, glaciers, way beyond. In the cosytuck of the world, the surface life, this will sound looney, to suggest that the force of downdraft needs attention. But think. How many times has anyone felt completely south of the north of themselves, as if a whole hemisphere is tangled? I think we need to simplify. Who am I? What do I want? What is my name?

All these confound. Who should I be, who was I as a child before, what I want needs approval, my name? Not the one I would choose, not now.

No Sniffing. Blow.