Mini Break

23rd August 2011

I’m taking a mini break from blogging. Nothing wrong - just tired and too busy. And afraid of being tedious on the page.

The hole in my leg is slowly healing. Manuka honey and homeopathy working their magic.

My father is ‘raging against the dying of the light’.

The pussy cat is still sick sometimes but I’ve stopped worrying about him.

My husband is taking the pills - the iodine and krill oil and Vitamin D. His heart is softening and he is attentive to me and feeling his way into a not-working life. He’s upset about losing his words. But not as upset as I am.

My life is rich and nourished by dear and loving family and friends. I feel so blessed in this.

The apples will need picking soon - they are already blushing red and bending their branches. Autumn is whispering in the wings.

I will be back.

Water Skiing

21st August 2011

I’m sitting on the edge of the bed rubbing hand cream into the dry skin on my shins. My husband is lying with his head on a wooden neck roller.

‘Are you alright?’ he asks.

‘Yes’.

‘Out of ten?’

‘Two’, I find myself saying without thinking about it.

‘I thought so,’ he says.

‘How about you?’ I ask him.

‘Seven or eight,’ he says.

We’ve had a lovely day walking with dear companions deep into the Blackdown hills in Somerset. It’s only the thoughts in my head which are dragging me down. Letting myself disappear down the drain like one of my husband's lost words.

I remember learning to water ski when I was eleven or twelve - the exhilaration, the pounding joy in my solar plexus when I crossed the wake for the first time without falling off. At the moment I’m half submerged in that water, clinging on to the rope, the outboard engine of the boat roaring in my ears as I’m yanked through the white wave, my skis gone. But not letting go - not drowning either.

Avocados and All of It

20th August 2011 Saturday

Some Good Moments from Today in spite of my grumpiness......

Sitting in a steamy cafe with dear friends, the rain pouring down outside, for brunch of boiled eggs and soldiers. My husband asks what are soldiers and laughs when the they arrive on my plate - sticks of buttered granary bread.

Talking to my sister on the phone - the husband of my niece has been evacuated from Syria - I’m so happy they will be visiting us next weekend.

My husband is upset - he rang me from Sainsbury’s this afternoon -

‘What did you ask me to get - not aubergines, not artichokes - what was it?’

‘Avocados,’ I say.

When he comes home I decide to stop hoovering and cleaning the loos and sit with him in the bedroom. I ask him what else he is upset about apart from forgetting the word for avocado. He tells me about his clay models - his distress about the lizard that broke, his worry about the money, not being able to hear the conversation in the cafe, not knowing how to contribute any more, not knowing how to support me - somehow take away my stress. I listen and feel hopeless about being able to change. Then we give each other some deeksha blessing and he says he feels better.

I carry on hoovering and I don’t feel any better. Except I’m glad he does.

Sharing how it is - my tearfulness, my grumpiness, my resistance, - with dear friends over the dinner table - knowing they accept me anyway - and in their loving company I feel less disconnected and stuck. They really like my Portuguese fish stew with the chermula and the redcurrant and blackberry tart with blackcurrant parfait for afters.

Later when they have gone home and we are clearing away the dishes I discover the bowl of roasted vegetables - red peppers and onions and aubergines - all melting sweet and garlicky - still keeping warm in the oven. I’m mortified I forgot to serve them. Then I realise I can take them tomorrow for the lunch to share after the village walk. And the redcurrant tart as well as we hardly ate any of it.

Harvest Sun

18th August 2011 Thursday

Wednesday

We leave London at dusk and drive west into a huge sky painting the clouds shell pink and gold with the brush of the melting harvest sun. We don’t stop once. The car steams up with Beethoven’s opera, Fidelio, at full choral volume. My husband sings along at the rousing bits and all the way home I let my tiredness leak away and think about the dear people we have stayed with these last few days. And I feel full up with friendship and talking and a wonderful birthday Mezze meal - still tasting the sweet smokiness of a triumphant Babaganoush in my memory.

Thursday

Wake up to drizzling rain and cold feet. And thudding pneumatic drills in the street outside our windows. All day I can’t shake the feeling of bleakness in my bones. I buy huge orange tomatoes in the market called Brandy Wine. And take back a cardigan I bought last week which is a muddy caramel pink and which looked a pale burnt ochre in the shop. And definitely doesn’t suit me. I put the heating on to dry the damp washing draped around the house. We have a mushy avocado salad for lunch which leaves me cold inside. Across the table my husband looks miserable. He says he’s feeling incompetent at the allotment - the pear laden tree falling down.

At my father’s I find a nearly full bottle of eye drops in the waste paper bin. He couldn’t see that it wasn’t empty. He says he’s forgetting things more and more as well.

He says, ‘ Everything is a bit fuzzy. I want to shake my head to make it all clear.’

I say, ‘Do you mean fuzzy in your eyes or in your head?’

‘Both’, he says, and we laugh. There isn’t really anything we can do about it.

Tonight I finally warm up in the company of a dear circle of friends and the magical sound of the Moola Mantra melts me like yesterday’s harvest sun, sinking into my bones.

Gifts of Many Plums

13th August 2011 Saturday

When I arrive at my father’s this afternoon he says,

‘Don’t sit down. I want you to peel me some of those Victoria plums you brought me.’

I’m so happy to find him a fruit that he likes, that isn’t too sour, that grew on the allotment. And there is an endless supply of them in our shed. They are very beautiful - long oval orbs, dusty pink skin verging on mauve, pale yellow flesh inside, warm and perfumed. But when I hand over bagfuls to the neighbours I advise caution as some of them - the biggest and prettiest - are hiding tiny, wriggling, pink caterpillars. They make a maze of gritty brown grooves in the meat of the plum spoiling the pleasure of that first luscious bite. I am well warned though and today I cut out all the bad bits and ended up with three kilos for the freezer. For that day in the hazy future when I’ll have time to make plum jam.

My father wants to talk about last night - he tried every single dish of the Middle Eastern Mezze meal I made for the birthday supper - and pronounced the babaganoush( although he can’t remember its name) and grilled halloumi cheese as his favourites. And the potatoes baked in salt with whole roasted garlic. And the beetroot with tatziki. And the honey mascapone cream on the carrot walnut cake.

But mostly he wants to remember his great grandson who he saw again for the second time last night and who he calls Little Snooks. I can feel the weight of him in my arms now - the back of his silk head against my shoulder and the delight he brings to the face of my sister when his blue blue eyes latch onto hers and he smiles a smile to capture your heart forever.

Now my husband is calling me - the bath is ready. I still haven’t packed. We are going away for four days tomorrow - visiting friends and family in Brighton and London. Bearing gifts of many plums.

In Another Country

11th August 2011 Thursday

Today I took a journey in my kitchen to the Middle East and the Mediterranean - to Greece, Spain, Lebanon and Morocco. I searched all my cookery books - ‘Moro’ by Sam and Sam Clark, ‘Arabesque’ by Claudia Roden, ‘Cranks Fast Food’ by Nadine Abensur, for recipes to make with the bagfuls of aubergines and tomatoes, courgettes and spinach that I bought in the market this morning. To conjure up the flavour of desert and palm tree, of hot blue skies and wild thyme hillsides, I spiked my dishes with cinnamon and mint, garlic and tahini, parsley and cumin, yoghurt and lemon. I burnt the skins of peppers, crushed chickpeas and whirred up minced lamb with garlic and coriander.

This foreign expedition is a combined birthday supper tomorrow for my nephew and his wife. I have been over ambitious though and now I’ve run out of time. I wanted to make Arab flat breads and Gazpacho - I wanted to make all of the recipes in all of my books - they look so enticing and delicious in the photographs. And possible too on a warm summer’s evening with all the doors and windows open in my suburban kitchen in Devon - the red roses and the white jasmine climbing the fences - glowing in the dusk.

All day I have been distracting myself from the shed at the bottom of the garden - stacked high with trays and trays of ripe Victoria plums - calling out to be eaten. Or cooked or given away. Demanding my attention. Which is elsewhere - in another country.

An Open Book

9th August 2011 Tuesday

Sitting with a dear friend and a cup of tea - she asks me what I think the hole in my leg is about. I find my self crying. So then I know what it’s about. It isn’t finished yet - feeling bereft, feeling sad for those lost things - the way it used to be with my husband, the way it won’t be now.

It’s not as if I keep looking back with regrets or looking forward with fear. It just feels like I’m floundering in a deep well fed by an underground river that keeps flowing and I can’t stop it. And I think I should. Stop it now. Stop all this grieving. Especially as my husband seems to be happy. It seems churlish somehow. As if he’s sailing on and I’m holding him back by still drowning in the river.

But the hole in my leg is open wide and weeping. No hiding it. So being open - opening up my heart - all the mess of it - instead of keeping it to myself - which has been my habit - seems to be the way I’m choosing to heal. However long that takes. Being an open book and letting you read me.

And today sitting with my friend, her voice like an a Tibetan singing bowl piercing my heart, I feel all the sadness of the world flow through me like a cresting wave and then break into a flood of emerald green light. Filling me up with the colour of love.

In the bath tonight my husband says,

‘Are you blogging about the plums and the blueberries?’

(The wheelbarrow full we picked at the allotment yesterday).

‘No’, I say, ‘I’m writing about the hole in my leg.’

‘Is it getting better?’

‘Yes, I think it is,’ I say, remembering the pulse of the emerald green light.

‘And I’ll write about the plums tomorrow.’