neighbours

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Island Blog – The Truth of It

We don’t tell the truth. No, we don’t. We decide on a persona as we get out of bed. We do this because, well, in my case certainly, there is an abundance of moaners wherever we/I go and we/I don’t align with moaning. However, this makes it tricky for truth telling. I know this, have known this for decades. It’s as if the one we once were, the upbeat, smiler, joker, uplifter is somehow fixed, like a creature in a snow globe or a face in an old photo, the one who never changes. But we all do.

This storm frightens me. The gusts up here on the island are loud and fiery, up to 80mph. I know, I do know, that my gone man knew exactly what he was buying. He knew the gales, the wind shifts, the structure of home, the waiting for challenge that it faced, whilst catching the sun and backed by a woodland of 180 year old pines, not one of which would ever fall on the house because the prevailing wind would always push them backwards and even as I sit here listening to the huge punches of storm, I know that they won’t fall on me. Still the noise is still scary. It’s as if all the worst devils, or the most fiery dragons are initiating a full frontal attack on my home, and not just mine. However, it was my big frickin window and I met it, wondering, in the dark of the onslaught, the sudden rush of colding down my stairway. I danced up, I did, and heard the sound of anguish, the pull and push, heard the defeat, saw the big window fighting against it’s fines, confines, the plastic and glue and whatever which holds this big-ass glass in situ. This wind was winning. Gusts of up to 85mph and just me. For now. And there’s a thing. I rose, I did, I know this fear, I have been against this power before. I remember.

The roar was deafening. Everything falling off everything else. Darkness outside, no-one there. Power out. The wind gusts terrifying. It’s dark now, scary. So, here am I, window was tight shut, and not open, at all, but even in that not open thing, a hinge broke. Split, freaked the whole frame out which, in my opinion was never an intelligent build. And then she bucked and pushed against gusts up to almost 90mph. I could do nothing, my strength a nothing. The window is big and heavy. In the dark and the slam of rain and wind, I ran to my neighbour who was alone with her kids. He’s at the pub, she said. I’ll drive down and get help. Men came but even they struggled with the power of the wind, managing, eventually, to drag in huge posts to wedge the window almost shut, the props against my bed, already drenched, then wedging my bed against the back wall. Mud and leaves and rain everywhere, but the window was re-instated at last and I am so very thankful to them. I slept in another room, well, sort of slept as the massive power circled my house, keening like a banshee, slamming huge unearthly fists against the face of my old stone home.

I heard no sounds beyond that during the night. Heard nothing of the devastation behind me, in the ancient pine woods. 20 massive old friends uprooted and lying on their backs, one of which flattened the Honey Shed whilst another fell right through the power line, leaving dangling wires. It took four days for any clearing, for the power to come back on, after everyone else got their light back the day before. And now, a hot shower after all those hours of cold and I’m okay and all the visits from neighbours, the delivery of soups and power chargers, all those hours of I’m okay when I wasn’t at all. I was scared, alone, small and without appetite. I was fearful that now I am responsible for the remaining pines in the woods, the ones which never bothered to grow a good spread of roots because the big guy in the face of all this wild shit is protecting the rest of us, or so they believed. These pines are now seriously wobbly because these huge gales will keep coming and they are not prepared for the onslaught.

It thinked me. Am I? All I have learned from himself must be in there somewhere, in my head, in my knowing. There is a huge amount over which I have no control, but there will be something, some things, over which I do. For now, however, I am thankful, yes, and completely wrung out. And my damage was nothing much in comparison to others.

I know that truth, but my truth is also the truth.

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Island Blog – Autumn, Our Gift.

I almost didn’t go to the pier today, to sit on the flat rock and to watch the tidal activity. Almost. Waking twirly and feeling it as the day slowed on, I conversed with myself as though to allow such a falter, to give it credence and approval. I will walk the short walk today, I said. It’s fine. I am allowed. But, as I moved closer to the exit opportunity, the rebel in me drew blood and stood in my path. I could see her in my mind’s eye and she laughed me. Ok, ok, I said, I will walk on. She withdrew to allow safe passage. I would so not want to challenge her.

Leaves are turning. Above my head, beech, alder, hornbeam and birch show me tip. That tip into Autumn, that acceptance with a rebel of colour shouting at them. No dying without colour, she says, no dying without that glorious dress of swish and ruby, of gold and speckles, that differentness that comes only now, only as Summer with all her flounce and confidence yawns like a princess and takes a first class flight across the world. There, she can astonish as only she can, lifting tired human minds, human bodies into swimsuits and flowing wraps and barbecues and beach encounters, but Autumn is pragmatic. She speaks to the dying light, to those on the cusp of change, she is change. And she does it well. Even though the storms may come and the light give way to a big dark, she is clever with time, for those who are watching. She is not one to sleep in.

The light lifts as I walk. Although it seems that the sky is closed, all grey and without comment, there is a shift. I can feel blue coming even if I cannot see it and it comes, with dissonant clouding and cerulean blue. For now it is just sweaty and cloying and my frocks clamp my skin. Then home again as Father Sun finds his spot and beams hot and sweaty after a jumper and boot day. I roll my eyes and peel off morning layers, damp down the fire. The temperature flips from nothing much to 27 degrees in a matter of moments. My neighbours suddenly barbecue. It is what we do if we are working with what is on offer, much like Autumn. I like her. She is feisty and determined. She is beauty in the face of death only it isn’t death. Death is forever, whereas she, Autumn is just one of four and playing her part. She is that jazz singer with a whisky/cigarette voice you hear whilst walking home, one that draws you in to hear more. She is nuts and berries, vibrant and wild, offering a harvest that comes only to her. She is preparation for the winter months when we all lose the plot, light endless candles, and pretend we don’t mind the dark and the cold. She is a herald, nonetheless. She is saying, get ready, pay attention, get real about this time, in particular, This Time, for we are all afraid, all wondering, all peering out at a world we are no longer sure about nor confident to walk in.

I won’t do the cheesy and say that this is nothing. It is not nothing. But we humans have survived, lived, loved danced and made a difference over and over for thousands of years. None of us know what will happen next but next is out there and we are right here, right now and this is Autumn. Our gift.

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Island Blog 40 – Show Yourself

Blog 40 - Goodly wives

 

I had three phone interviews yesterday about Island Wife, due to be published on March 28th by Two Roads.  I think there will be more to come over the next short while when I am new news as opposed to old news, which I will be by the second week of April.  By then the sound of running feet will be receding, not coming closer – such is our quick-quick world.  I will be standing here, open-mouthed and half way through the answer to a very personal question, laying down my words, one by considered one, only to find the room has cleared in a heartbeat.

So, it seems of the greatest importance that I use this platform with the respect it requires, for the legacy I leave behind will be the things I have said, that may be remembered, for life and death are in the power of the tongue.   Words will leave me and attach themselves to the hems of departing coats only to be re-assembled through the filters of a very different person, using a different emphasis, perhaps, a different tone of voice.  What I say may not be what is printed or spoken out.  What I mean may not travel the distance.

And so it is in relationships, those ships that fascinate me most of all.  Every one of us in one, like it or not.  Some of us are crossing oceans, through angry storms, turning our faces into biting ice winds that threaten to tear off our very skin; some bob gently across a mirrored calm, the sun warming our bones, and some just putter up and down the same claggy-banked strip of canal on an ancient barge with rusty screws, a draggletail posy of wild flowers in an old jam jar on the cabin roof.  But this is to stereotype and is not therefore the truth.  The truth is that we all travel storm wards at some point in our lives, and at others we bob across the mirror and in between, we deadhead the draggletailed posy whilst the endless ordinary banks pass us by.  And whilst we do all this, we bring that of ourselves to the table, to our relationships.  We bring likes and dislikes, opinions and phobias, passions and failings, gifts and skills.

In an ideal relationship, such as the one my neighbour has, or my sister, or that woman I read about

in last weeks Sunday magazine who lives beside the sea with a loving man and who has enough money to spend on whatever she wants to spend it on, neither person fights to control.  Neither person pulls rank, manipulates either by loud domination or weak dependency and neither wants anything less than to lift the Apple of their eye up to whatever light warms them.  My opinion of what you should or should not do, has no place in our relationship.  My only role is to love you, and to love you right I must remove myself.  My……Self.

This doesn’t mean I am silent and fuming in the corners.  It doesn’t mean I don’t tell you loud and clear when I am angry or upset with something you have done or said.  What it does mean is that I can be honest, create my own boundaries, speak with my own voice, make my own choices and leave you to do the same for yourself.  I expect nothing from you and you expect nothing from me, and both of us give and receive freely.  It sounds like perfection, you say, too perfect to attain, but it’s not perfection.  It is Love. Love for myself and Love for you.

The journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step, and I am single-stepping right now as the Island Wife considers her response to another personal question.  There are often two answers to that question, two directions.   One choice.  Mine.