Saturday, I spend at my sister's farm,
walking the Labryinth that I helped to build 20 years ago with a group of wonderful women,
asking for blessings when I reach the centre,
toasting marshmallows on the fire on a long stick whittled to a sharp point by my
7 year old great nephew,
sitting with him on the round iron grill of the deep ancient well at the farm and listening for the plop and splash of the stones that he pushes through the bars. It's so deep there are seconds of delay before they hit the water.
Playing football with him later - well, trying to keep him from scoring goals between the two deflated beach balls marking the goal posts. Not successful at all. Maybe it was the wellies I was wearing, or that I can't run very fast any more, or just that he is a great little footballer.
For the last 2 days I've been laid very low ...staying in bed with a temperature, raging headache,
raw, constricted chest and horrid cough.
It's rare for me to get an infection...I haven't been ill since Robin died, not like this when my world comes to a total halt - ( what To-Do List?) I don't care about anything or anyone and I succumb to the utter misery of feeling as weak as a wobbly lamb.... I just want to plunge my head in a bucket of ice and lie on hot water bottles for my aching back.
At some point during one of the sleepless nights I find myself shaking all over - it's a temperature, but it feels like uncontrollable fear....I take paracetamol and slowly it passes.
I remember that the lungs are the seat of grief....soaking it in like a sponge....letting it out bit by bit ...like now - out of the blue - with my sharp scratching cough.
The physical pain is not nearly as bad as the long drop of hurt inside me. I haven't heard it yet - the splash of landing, without loss, at the bottom of the well.
I'm mending now... and off to London for 3 days. To stay with my big sister and visit her daughter and 10 month old granddaughter. I wouldn't miss it for anything. But I will drive slowly and take paracetamol with me.
Back here at the end of the week.
What a perfect piece of writing - the para that includes 'the splash of landing without loss'. So sorry about your illness - it sounds horrible. Lovely pic of a goldfinch. Also interested to learn in the previous post about the siskin and starling - I've not seen either here. Have been thinking about what you said about sparrowhawks and sudden death (the post before the previous post). I was startled when a sparrowhawk arrived in our garden one day. It's such a shock and they look so different from the other birds - I thought it was a pantomime bird at first with baggy spotted trousers.
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