October 6, 2021

Busy doing nothing

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Busy doing nothing

I used to ascribe my almost legendary ability to sit still, to a simple – or perhaps, not so simple – realisation of the physical effort of getting a life.

If, as I do believe, it takes me a lot of energy to do a thing, that tends to mitigate against doing it. Thus, I have spent a lot of my time doing little except either reading about other peoples’ exciting lives, or worse, watching other people doing things.

Perhaps there is another factor at play.  

My family, and especially my parents, were and are opinionated. That is, generally, a good thing; and nothing new. My mother however, has also been and remains, incredibly contrary. So, I share a family joke that goes,

Fran: Mum, you realise you contradict everything I say.

Mum: No I don’t! That’s’ just not true…

And I notice afresh how often what I say will be met with contradiction. For example, if Mum has had a good night’s rest, she will say she doesn’t need or want night-time carers. Conversely, if there were no night-time carers in place she will just as easily complain of having had a bad time of it, and that the long watches of the night are dreadful to endure alone… It may well be that the progress of her illness exacerbates an existing underlying trend, so that what was previously accepted as the sometimes-amusing quirk of a contrary nature now becomes glaringly obvious.

But in the particular context of what this means for my own behaviour, I have to conclude firstly, that – well, yes! – if one grows up knowing that whatever one says or does will meet with criticism or contradiction, one learns it is best to do and say as little as possible; and secondly, if I don’t wish to replicate that pattern of learned uselessness in anyone else, I must never criticise anyone, nor comment too forcefully on what they choose to do.

After all, I do know, intimately, how hard it is to do anything when one is watched with eagle-eyed interest, and one’s every action and utterance is subjected to pointed comment. It’s only recently that I have realised that (a) it wouldn’t matter what I chose to do, the response would be the same; (b) it’s a habit so ingrained that it’s totally not personal; therefore (c) not only may I follow my own path, but I must do so.

Thanks so much for reading.  

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September 10, 2021

Do people forget?

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Do people forget?

By now, I’ve been intimately involved with my mother’s affairs for several years. And whereas even members of my family will say on occasion, “It’s just to collect Mum’s meds, she’s just out of hospital!” or “It’s only one day, what’s the problem?” I can’t help feeling an ache and exhaustion in my bones, nor can I escape the regret of knowing that doing any physical task – let alone tasks for my mother that have become loaded with worry, regret and sorrow – takes me three times as much energy as for someone who walks easily, who can stroll at the run twice as fast as I stagger, and who doesn’t have to worry about falling off pavements and such like. For me, there are no longer any ‘simple’ things.

Do people forget to see that? In the midst of others’ busy lives, I find that my very real limitations impede their expectations of what I will do for them. Even my nearest and dearest sometimes appear to be oblivious to my exhaustion. But though I’m still here, still working, I have finally begun to accept that the end result of continuing to work as I have done, navigating and dealing with constant demands and a shifting landscape of imperatives and semi-disasters, for me will be complete physical and emotional collapse.

I have no wish to go down that route. So, as a first priority, I have to do what I can to set my own agenda and stick with it. Faced with seemingly endless and tiring jobs to manage for other people, this is the only answer I can summon: I must do first what I need to do, and the rest will have to be dealt with by others, or simply not dealt with. Any and various disasters that crop up will either have to be endured, allowed to languish, or sorted out, and not always by me. It’s what we planned for in any case: no-where has it ever been writ, or stated, that I am my mother’s physical carer, or that I am available for her every beck and call.

In recognition of that, I have to truly begin to accept my limitations and step back, so that, little by little, I can reassert my right to make choices which, though they may not always be the best, are at least my own.

My mother will approve of my desire to reassert my freedom in what is, after all, my own life.

Thanks for reading.

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August 30, 2021

The speed at which I work

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The speed at which I work

Recent events have been a painful reminder to me that I’m not being entirely honest when I say that “I’m fine, I can manage.” It appears to me now, that the speed at which I work is not what others – nor what I – suppose it to be.

Yes, I can manage, and I do. But the effort of managing takes its toll, as does the effort to maintain the appearance of being able to do what others do, at their speed, and with the insouciance that seems almost universally expected: just because they understand what they are talking about and always work at the run, does not mean that I do, or can.

Recently my mother was discharged from hospital – again. Only this time it seems to have been done in a hurry. Perhaps that is down to my mother’s own very clearly expressed misery at once again being in hospital, and her doubtless acute desire to get home as soon as possible. But the end result has been, that when the physio, the staff nurse, the OT, the carers or the GP surgery manage to contact me, I’m expected to leap up, agree with their requests and do what I’m told immediately. “Go here, fetch that, yes, now.”

And I have no objection, in principle, to this. I’m glad to know what I can, or need to do, to help matters to settle satisfactorily. But whereas a walk round to my mother’s would, for an Anita or a Bob be a matter of cheerful moments to be leapt into and thereafter instantly forgotten on the way to the next thing, for me it requires at least a half hour of thought and action, the interruption of my hastily cobbled together sandwich, and a traipse through the complex morass of my emotions to achieve a fresh accommodation with my other priorities.

Does having to meet the taxi driver who is bringing my mother’s medications from the hospital mean I won’t get any lunch? Will yet another trip to my mother’s front door – the third in a busy morning – mean that I can’t go with my daughter to do what we had previously planned? After well-nigh four years of leaping and sorting and late-night emergency dashes in the car, what’s the best way to do this next thing quickly?

(to be continued)

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August 18, 2021

A Day to myself

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A day to myself.

Today, having a rare day all to myself, thus far I have worked hard and still have several hours in which to write. So I am writing, and after all my worrying about whether or if I would or could, I find that writing has its own momentum and happens simply, without the angst, and perhaps because I decide it will: Note to self: Cure for writer’s block: Just decide to write and then start writing.

So I’m finally back to reading through my novels – YAY! – and after a year of leaving them lying almost fallow, I am delighted to read and review them slightly differently, happy to refine them further with refreshed eyes. It’s a pleasure to do so, and to trip through them with a clearer idea of why I’m writing and what I wish to say.

The relief of that reassurance – that when I have a day to myself, I can write, and that there is still life in my work that feels meaningful to me, after all – is immense and most encouraging, knowing now that I can work hard when the occasion presents itself. I know without having to remind myself, that the opportunity to write and edit is always beneficial.

Perhaps if I had realised and truly understood this sooner, I would have spared myself a lot of rumbling anxiety of the sort that hovers in the background and occasionally bursts through in moments of self-doubt. Increasingly, I realise that everything we do has its time and place. And occasionally, this means that fallow periods in the field of writing are meant to arrive and stay with us, to allow us to rest and regroup, learning differently and coming back to our work with fresh perspectives. It’s no use constantly working at the hewing and chopping of wood: sometimes we need to leave things be, to allow them to grow in peace.

Thanks for reading.

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August 4, 2021

In times of trouble

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In times of trouble

In times of trouble, what do I do? I retrench, engage in lots of quick-fire displacement activity – my favourites include clearing out the kitchen cupboards and throwing out ‘stuff’ – and like a magpie I shop for small things and think about judicious hoarding of essentials – brown rice, favourite wholemeal pasta, a carton or two of long-life milk for emergencies.

And speaking personally, when I’m stressed, I read as though my life depends on it: novels, non-fiction and just about anything I can get my hands on. Some others might use that sense of urgency and gentle panic to write; and I might, too, were it not for the dozens of excuses that crowd my brain: it’s the holidays, my family are around, I don’t feel like it, I can’t settle… As the author Winifred Watson – in the preface to the new ‘Persphone’ edition to her novel “Miss Pettigrew Lives for a Day” – told her interviewer, “You can’t write when you’re never alone”.  

Original ‘Persphone’ Edition of ‘Miss Pettigrew’

What is the trouble? Not merely an accustomed, lived-with malaise at the way life has settled into seemingly unbreakable rhythms of lock-down and doing less, while doing endless things for others. A shift in emphasis from the foreign to the more domestic seems, in my case, to translate into a strong disinclination to go back to working on my own novels and short stories – not the ones I’m reading, but those I am writing and that date from before lockdown.

 So much of what I might, or should, or may otherwise have to deal with, feels as if it’s currently stalled in a gigantic ‘pending’ folder, while still intruding into my thoughts to demand attention. And when I do get a sunny space, and some time in which I might work – and I do feel immensely fortunate in life – I would far rather read other stories than attempt to listen to my characters and fashion outcomes with them… They might starve for want of attention, but when I try to give them some sustenance, I find myself empty, and unable to assist even though I want to.

I can only apologise. I do hope that when I feel ready to start writing again, my characters are still speaking to me.

Thanks for listening.

 

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July 14, 2021

A forgotten inheritance

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A forgotten inheritance

Recently clearing some of my mother’s books, in a small book-case I discovered a low shelf behind a door, concealing a forgotten inheritance: two-dozen post-war ‘economy’ hardback and paperback ‘English’ mysteries, often written for an American readership.

Instead of my usual habit of immediately stowing them into the car to take to the second-hand shop, something stopped my hand, and I’ve been skimming through them with interest: Daphne du Maurier’s ‘Hungry Hill’ a sepia-toned allegory on the pointlessness of greed; ‘While the Patient Slept’ a 1930’s whodunnit showing its age; a whole variety of unusual, older novels collected and shipped to my mother in France and then finally, one day, finding their way back to Scotland.

Near the bottom of the pile I hit a nugget of gold, Garrison Keillor’s “Lake Wobegon Days” (1985) and feel enormous relief to have discovered something so well written, humorous and engaging. I’ve enjoyed laughing along with his stories, refreshed and enlightened in equal measure.

Rather incongruously, I’ve also found a worn copy of Robert Harris’ ‘Pompeii’ which, though I have read it at least twice previously, is just as exciting to read again. Finally, a first-edition hardback of Edna O’Brien’s ‘Lantern of Slides’ which though as well-written and thoughtful as ever, is not a book to dip into for summery, refreshing escapism: the characters seem to be uniformly gloomy and unlucky: suicide, madness and murder may make good short story fodder, but this volume is one to avoid if one is feeling even a twinge of covid gloom.

I’m so glad to be reading, and in a strange way reassured, to discover among the books I love, those I dislike, and to be confirmed in my reasons for choosing not to spend time with various authors. I love Jane Austen and the Bronte sisters, so my dislike of 1950’s and 1990’s noir is not merely prejudice against what might be slightly out-dated, but based firmly around what I enjoy. Which, I reflect, is also useful for the time when I may get back to writing my own stories again.

Thanks for reading.

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June 28, 2021

‘Miss Carter’s War’ by Sheila Hancock

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‘Miss Carter’s War’ by Sheila Hancock

This novel, and the novel previously reviewed, I found myself reading at much the same time. My eyes drawn to their covers, I’m surprised to notice that both feature images of headless women – what is it with headless women? – both viewed from the side and wearing dresses and red shoes and waiting demurely. Both images do, at least, help to place the action in a certain era – post-war – with all that implies: Feisty women who make it through the war, and what happens next?

I’m intrigued by Sheila Hancock: she seems a woman of many parts, and at the same time nicely elusive and not easy to categorise. Not seeking fame, exactly, but famous because of her abilities to act. And to write. Predictably enough, this novel features a heroine who has won the croix de guerre after her involvement with the resistance in France, coping with all manner of horrors before landing up in England and finding employ as a teacher in a fairly select school for girls. Miss Carter is naturally brilliant, and particularly good at getting overlooked children to engage with their own education.

As with ‘The Railwayman’s Wife’ I feel almost as if the plot is secondary to character study. Miss Carter is interesting, engaging and her portrayal, as a woman trying her best against a difficult system, is sincere. As her own personal education advances through the 1940’s and 1950’s, we meet and also get to know Miss Carter’s supporting cast: the headmistress, severe but with a heart of gold; the only male teacher in the school, who, it turns out, is gay – a big secret to carry at the time; two underachievers in her class whose newly woken academic aspirations slam hard against the social and economic realities they have to endure.

As the novel proceeds through the years, it is an easy and engrossing read, with not a few high-notes of moral indignation. One gets the distinct impression that although Hancock is writing fiction, she writes from bitter experience, which has left her kinder, more tolerant of others, impatient of systems and politics getting in the way of happiness for ordinary folk. Not a bad ambition.

I find myself wanting to use words like ‘obvious’ and ‘a bit naïve’, but there is something in Hancock’s portrayal of the characters that pulls at my heartstrings. For all the plot twists and turns, I do get engrossed with the characters and want the story to end well. It doesn’t, not quite; which causes me to brood and to feel regret, not (in suprising contrast to my previous book review) that the author didn’t give me a ‘happy ending’ but that the characters had to suffer so much.

This story reminds me how precious is our personal dignity, and not to take for granted the freedoms that have been won for the under-represented in society through the years. The gains we now enjoy have often been achieved at great personal cost. If you would like a good read, kindly and thoughtful, Sheila Hancock’s book has a few worthwhile surprises in store.

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May 27, 2021

‘The Railwayman’s Wife’ by Ashley Hay

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‘The Railwayman’s Wife’ by Ashley Hay

My husband bought a copy of ‘The Railwayman’s Wife‘ in an independent bookshop some years ago, and it has languished on our bedroom bookcase, until, in line with my new philosophy of ‘let’s explore what we already own’ my husband chose it for me. Finally, I dipped in.

‘The Railwayman’s Wife’ by Ashley Hay repays close reading: unashamedly literary and reflective, it brims with quiet, beautifully described images that I find very refreshing: I hardly need to visit Australia, I can just absorb the language of this novel and the beauty that Hay conjures so deftly. Though I find I get the best from it when I read slowly, the plot is fairly minimal: man dies, his lovely wife and daughter manage for a while without him somehow, while two possible future mates come into widow’s orbit, one eventually marrying another woman, the other dying a tragic, minimalist death prefigured by unrequited love for the widow.

Sorry, is that a spoiler? You need not regard it as such.

This is a lovely book, one which has opened my eyes afresh to the power of simple words arranged on the page to convey deep and powerful meaning. I do, however, have one major quibble with the way in which the line of the plot unspools. Yes, the book is primarily character-driven, and yes, there is a certain inevitability in the widow at the end of the novel finding herself once more alone, without a man dangling after her who might offer hope of a new life, protection and security. But I’m struggling to take the death of the second man seriously.

Not only does he seemingly almost evaporate somehow in a very artistic fashion that leaves a lot to the imagination, but as anyone with unrequited longings will know, life is not that easily snuffed out. Also, I can’t for the life of me work out why the protagonists are so quiet, why they never actually get round to speaking their minds, daring to tell the truth. Is it the times they live in? The expectations they are hemmed in by? Probably. Yet, for an obviously clever woman, the widow seems remarkably slow on the uptake, and I can’t help just wishing that the plot had unwound with enough fire to keep the key characters alive until the end.

If they had just said what they needed to, found the courage to take the risk of being honest with each other, that would have been enough of a lesson – and dramatic enough – for a satisfying ending. I’m annoyed, somehow, that the plot finishes on a tragic whimper, and in a way that I can hardly credit.

Yes, there is of course the irony of a sad man who has survived so much to arrive home after the Second World War in one piece, only to end his life on a beach… And perhaps we expect too much of our characters to hope that everyone might speak their mind.

But if that was me, and I had survived hell on earth, I would want to run and shout and tell the truth and not waste another minute in quiet, respectful, erroneous introspection. There would have been room, and plenty of credibility, in a conclusion which had gumption in it, smiles and hugs and happy endings.

Just saying.

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May 21, 2021

Black-Eyed Peas on New Year’s Day

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‘Black-Eyed Peas on New Years’ Day: An Anthology of Hope’ Edited by Shannon Page.

Featuring in ‘Black-Eyed Peas on a New Year’s Day’, a new anthology of short stories, I bought two paper copies for my own use, and have been reading the collection carefully over several weeks, as so many of the stories merit closer study and reflection.

Starting the New Year with a dish of black-eyed peas is traditionally good luck. And ‘Black-Eyed Peas on a New Year’s Day‘ is a feel-good collection, mainly of fantasy offerings, carefully and colourfully written, with some real humdingers included to get the pulse racing. It’s very interesting to notice how a collection is put together, and how it, perhaps deliberately, perhaps unconsciously, reflects the genre preferences and tastes of the commissioning editor. That is obvious, but how often have I assumed, just because I like a story, that others will like it too?

We don’t all suit the same colours, wear the same clothes or think about the same things; and in variety is strength, so I have been nicely reminded that taste is very personal, and not to swerve around something unusual just because it hasn’t had much of a place in my usual library: this collection is refreshing, intriguing and very well written, and I do recommend it to anyone who would like to be thoughtfully entertained, or who, perhaps, is used to saying that fantasy holds no appeal for them. We may have been reading in the wrong places. Perhaps now is a good time to stretch our expectations and see how life colours up differently.

I’ve appreciated having this volume at my bedside because I find it cheering, inventive and involving. There are stories that excite and which I find genuinely charming – such rip-roaring imagination! – and which give me a glimpse of how I can write inventively too, when I allow my imagination and sense of humour to fly. Thank you to Shannon for such a warm, heart-felt project, colourful and invigorating in the early days of a cool Springtime. Delicious stories collected together make this a volume to cherish.

Thanks for reading.

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May 17, 2021

More Lessons from lockdown

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More Lessons from lockdown

Have I learned any enduring lessons from lockdown? I have to admit to feelings of puzzlement and slightly desperate nausea when the travel industry and the ‘frequent fliers club’ enthuse about air travel getting ‘back to normal’ soon. Is it ‘normal’ to expect to fly everywhere? And should we be aiming to get back to ‘business before covid’? What about the climate crisis and protecting the environment? If covid has shown me anything, it is the vulnerability of our erstwhile ‘normal’ expectations.

I’ll not fly by plane again, unless it is to visit somewhere like New York – there not being ships available to make the journey, as there used to be in the ‘good old days’ circa 1920…  – but will be looking to travel by Eurotunnel or other scheduled ferry and overland services if the need arises. As my husband often says, “I like to make the journey part of our holiday.”

This year, I’m going to think twice before buying non-consumables, though that is proving to be a challenge. I seem to live a fairly minimal lifestyle as it is, and sometimes I yearn to splurge, but it’s a good discipline first make use of what we have, and to look afresh at all the books already in our bookcases, the cds and other things in the home. Do I need more? Can what I have be recycled? Redeployed?

If I go too far down the minimalist road, I might find all my shelves and rooms empty, except for two changes of clothes in my wardrobe and my computer. I will not, therefore, be ‘getting rid’ of my old clothes, CDs, paper books, and dictionaries, since ‘getting rid’ of these is merely passing their matter sideways. Anyway, in the course of a life, one does find favourites, and these I will keep. So until my ‘legacy’ collection of CDs is rendered entirely obsolete, I shall reinstall my CD drive on my computer whenever the latest updates delete it. A small price to be able to work with music of my choice.

I feel so blessed to live in the world as we have made it now. Freed of the need to go and find firewood and water, and walk twenty miles for healthcare, there is so much I can do to please myself. We have so many chances to be happy. These may be small, but to preserve the ability of others to access that happiness, we must do more to help each other. The world – like the democratic freedoms we have rather taken for granted – is a fragile, complex web, infinitely precious and worth preserving.

Thanks so much for reading.

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