tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-329130722024-02-08T02:39:51.436+00:00Livvy's Life'It is important, when death finds you,
that it finds you alive'
AnonLivvy U.http://www.blogger.com/profile/15954289268370454513noreply@blogger.comBlogger167125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-32913072.post-5510632248421240202013-02-02T22:38:00.000+00:002013-02-02T22:38:46.141+00:00Really Thoughts<br />
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There’s a column in <i>The
Guardian’s </i>Saturday magazine called ‘What I’m Really Thinking’. It’s always anonymous, and it does just what
its headline suggests: allows someone to tell their secrets without letting on
who they are.<o:p></o:p></div>
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I was going to write for it tonight. I counted the words of this week’s column, to
see how many I’d be allowed. I noted the
email address.<o:p></o:p></div>
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It was that, or posting here. But, I thought, too many people who might
just still come here, over a year since I last posted, know who I am. Do I really <i>want</i> them to know what I’m really
thinking? <o:p></o:p></div>
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Do I? Do I care? Don’t my best friends know anyway? <o:p></o:p></div>
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I’m not sure, is the answer to that one. I don’t think I talk about this very
often. I don’t know how to.<o:p></o:p></div>
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So I won’t be emailing in an edited-down piece of 250 words. I will write
here, I've decided, and let the thoughts flow: my 'Really Thoughts', that won’t let me rest, or sit peaceably with myself, until sitting on a page:<o:p></o:p></div>
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<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<span style="color: #674ea7;">I’m fifty. I don’t
tell people that very often. When the local
journalist who interviewed me last year asked me, I declined to tell him on
principle. People start to put you in
boxes, and decide things about you, and I’d much rather it came out, as it
sometimes does once I have got to know someone, as a point of surprise.</span></blockquote>
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<span style="color: #674ea7;">Though there is slightly less surprise these days than there
used to be, I’ve noticed. It has long been
a source of pleasure that there was always such a very long gap between what
people guessed my age to be, and what it really is. Recently I’ve found myself staring into my
face, trying to map the infinitesimal changes which, compounded, ring in the
extra years in a stranger’s perception of my age.</span></blockquote>
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<span style="color: #674ea7;">I’m a woman at 50 – actually I turned fifty last year, amid
a series of gloriously planned, theatrical moments designed to make 2012 one of
my best years yet. It is really only
now, ten months later, that the turning of the decade seems to have hit home.</span></blockquote>
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<span style="color: #674ea7;">Let’s look at the facts.
There are two ways of looking, I’ve discovered, depending on the day, say,
or the weather, or my mood.</span></blockquote>
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<span style="color: #674ea7;">The first goes like this: I’m fifty and I have a stunning
child of whom I’m inordinately proud and in 2010 I started a business doing
something I have never done before, and at the end of last year, with a fairytale-like
flourish to round off my special year, I won two awards for it.</span></blockquote>
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<span style="color: #674ea7;">The second, and the one currently playing at the cinema,
runs as follows: I’m fifty, I’m an older mother, my extraordinarily
unsuccessful marriage (which is not officially over yet because I can’t afford
to get divorced) left me with literally nothing, having been forced to sell the
only asset in which I had a large stake, my house, in order to pay off mounting
debts; my business, though a runaway critical success, is a dismal financial
failure and, more importantly than anything else at 9.15pm on a Saturday night,
I am no one’s person. I am alone.</span></blockquote>
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<span style="color: #674ea7;">The fifty thing. I
know I keep going on about it. But
something is happening over which I have little control, and I need to get an
attitude before it obsesses me further.
Slowly, with perhaps one or two more people being thrown into the mix
every day, slowly, slowly I am becoming invisible. It is happening.</span></blockquote>
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<span style="color: #674ea7;">I have heard of this phenomenon from women, and their differing
reactions. Some love the fact that how
they look no longer bothers their lives.
They can move through their lives unnoticed, reaching their
destinations faster, unhampered by having to deal with the attentions and the
judgements of men.</span></blockquote>
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<span style="color: #674ea7;">Others, like myself, feel bereft. Now let’s face it, it’s not like I was ever
heavily burdened by the attentions of men in the first place – being someone
who grows on you with the knowing, and not one who makes an instant visual hit. But there were, of course, always moments as
I moved through the years. To be honest,
there are occasionally moments now – of admiration, of appreciation. But now that the years are accelerating and
the chances of finding a unique individual who would wish to share my thoughts,
my life and my bed diminish, I feel the apparent, albeit unconfirmed, loss of
such things just - dreadful.</span></blockquote>
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<span style="color: #674ea7;">Having finally recovered enough of myself from the wreckage of
my marriage to the Bim, I find the lack of physical contact in my life
heartbreaking. It’s like missing a limb,
not sharing myself physically with another.
And I have discovered that it is getting harder and harder to maintain a
healthy sense of myself as a younger-rather-than older person
without that kind of intimate physical affirmation. Will I ever, ever, I realise I am wondering,
find someone who will embrace all of me again: my lived-in body, my stretchmarked
stomach (once so astonishingly flat!); my less than perfect body lines?</span></blockquote>
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<span style="color: #674ea7;">These things, then, worry at me these days. I am so busy with the day-to-day buffeting of
life, ricocheting as I do from home to school to meeting, to the odd dinner with
a friend, that I can’t often articulate this creeping fear, to myself,
or to another. I want to document it
here so that I may know, one future day, what I was really thinking, at fifty, a woman, and alone.</span></blockquote>
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Livvy U.http://www.blogger.com/profile/15954289268370454513noreply@blogger.com10tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-32913072.post-60191595731144471002011-12-18T23:12:00.000+00:002011-12-18T23:12:12.045+00:00Getting HereIt is almost as though I have <i>had</i> to write, yesterday and today. It's as though if I don't channel the creative energy I have charging around in me I'll combust!<br />
<br />
What happened? I keep asking myself. How, how did the shift occur? I hardly dare trust it, but certainly for some weeks now I have been waking without the constant, debilitating sense of failure and fear of the summer months. Instead I have a conscious determination to effect the changes I want to see for myself and Anna-mouse. These changes are much the same as they were a year ago, and six months ago, but somehow they appear to have become attainable, rather than desperate fantasies serving to re-inforce that awful subtext of gloom.<br />
<br />
In the middle of August, really not that long ago, there was a day when I gave in: I arrived at the doctor's office, sat with my head in my hands, and wept. When I returned home I sat at my computer and did the best thing I could have done that day to keep myself sane. I wrote to a circle of closest friends and told them that I was not okay.<br />
<br />
The robust, steady, loving and practical replies I received in response to my outpouring upheld me at that time when I could barely imagine a well and happy me. And it was the knowledge that I really wasn't alone, even though I so frequently felt it, that kept me walking out. Literally. A cleverer part of me decided that moving my anxiety was better than sitting with it, so every day I took myself to a local playing field and walked around it. Round and round. As many times as I could. Which wasn't many at first, because I was weak and my chest hurt and my body had forgotten that it is strong.<br />
<br />
Somehow, I began to lift. After many long and moving discussions with friends about its pros and cons, I decided to put the packet of Prozac the doctor had prescribed me to the back of the cupboard and spent instead an extraordinary amount of money I didn't have on vitamins and minerals and herbs. I began the tortuous mental unpicking of what was left of the Bim and me, to free him for his new love, and free me to accept it.<br />
<br />
A glorious person gave me some money. I bought some nights in a luxurious hotel, took hot bath after hot bath, and when I returned from that trip I knew that I could begin the previously unthinkable task of selling my house. It sold! <br />
<br />
And here we are, four months, one house sale, one acting job, one school term, one near-perfect first date and one month of daily blogging later, <i>in an entirely different place. </i>I shouldn't be surprised - I mean, it was me who made the journey - but how did I get here? Yes, okay, the near-perfect first date has had much to do with my recent delight with life, because in just half a day the lovely youngish man reminded me that possibility comes in all shapes and guises, and that it comes to me, as well as to others. But now I know that the near-perfect first date might remain a near-perfect only date you might expect me to be diving, mightn't you?<br />
<br />
But I'm not - and I don't know why! Inexplicable. Really, I wish I could name the thing which took me from that summer place and brought me here. I want to bottle it so that when the darkness comes again I can unstopper the bottle and take a swig. Or, more satisfyingly, give it to others to ease their pain.<br />
<br />
I have a feeling that time has something to do with it. A sense of the trajectory of one's own life is a perspective almost impossible to have when young. Now that I am ending a decade I am struck with an urgency to act. I have a sense that if I don't act now, while I can, much could pass me by. I have discovered that it adds a piquancy to the smallest moment, thinking in this way.<br />
<br />
While I live some more trying to figure all this out, I want to record that it is simply amazing, recent morning after recent morning, to wake with hope instead of dread.Livvy U.http://www.blogger.com/profile/15954289268370454513noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-32913072.post-75799187887898210272011-12-17T18:15:00.000+00:002011-12-17T18:15:12.997+00:00Tea BreakIt was a day full of rain here in the south east of England, last Sunday.<br />
<br />
Most of the day the clouds held the water just above our heads: great grey cushions bursting with drops. Finally, around five, they began to fall.<br />
<br />
I was outside when the rain began, at the tea tent, because the country house in which we were filming did not allow food and drink inside. The house was somewhere north west of London, buried in rolling fields dotted with sheep. We all 'aaahhed!' when we first walked in. It was the perfect setting for our scene - a library masquerading as a public school staffroom during the First World War.<br />
<br />
I had been awake since some ungodly hour in the morning. It was still dark when my driver picked me up. The luxury! We flew around the M25 as dawn pinned the trees to the horizon. These days, when I find myself actually doing the thing I've always wanted to do since donning a pair of fingerless mittens and a scowl to play the part of Scrooge at the age of seven, I am wise enough to savour every minute.<br />
<br />
The 'second' met me at Base Unit and guided me across the muddy forecourt of the outbuildings to my portion of a winibago: my own little portable room, complete with shower and toilet! Soon they brought me to make-up; then it was back to shiver at the icy hands of the wardrobe lady as she laced me into a corset. Instantly I am standing straighter, my figure is transformed and once the clothes are on I have become the stern, high-collared person I have been cast to play.<br />
<br />
Then begins the waiting, a very special art every actor has to learn - particularly challenging in a corset, when sitting down for too long or in too low a chair is agony.<br />
<br />
Just before lunch they call me and the rest of the women in my scene to a 'line-up' for the cameras. We are driven through the estate to the house and ushered into a billiard room, where we run our lines in a mood verging on hysterical. <br />
<br />
<i>I love actors</i>, I think. <i>I love the way we get through. I love the way we all know we're dispensable, and make light of it, and deliver, excellently, because we also know that we're better than our parts and that we will make the thing look even better than it already is.</i><br />
<i><br />
</i><br />
Looking round our characterful shapes and faces, I see that thought has gone into our casting, and I know that it is not often that a chance like this comes around, to work with the best.<br />
<br />
Suddenly, we're in the room and 'on'. <i>One, two, three ACT!</i> a favourite tutor of mine used to say at drama school, and it was a bit like that, really. We were there to deliver, almost first time, which is what we did.<br />
<br />
A couple of hours later the scene was in the can. There was a little frisson as we realised that a couple of the series' stars were filming in the room next door - they wandered by in evening dress, and for all the world, bar the cables, and cameras, and countless crew, we were there, in the latter stages of the First World War, glimpsing the staircase of a gentlemen's club.<br />
<br />
Someone mentioned tea and sandwiches and a couple of us grabbed our coats and headed out into the bitter cold. Lunch had been hours ago, and anyway we couldn't eat much because of the corsets. We grabbed polysterene cups and thick cut, generously filled triangles and giggled our way through the break.<br />
<br />
All of a sudden I was the only one out there, nursing my steaming tea, facing the dark as the rain began to fall. Rivulets of water glittered in the headlights of a location truck as they coursed from the roof of the tea tent. I could see my breath.<br />
<br />
And I felt happy. Looking through the rain to the black fields beyond, taking a break from what I do best, contemplating the year that has passed and the year that is to come, I was happy.Livvy U.http://www.blogger.com/profile/15954289268370454513noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-32913072.post-55286869456656848012011-12-02T23:15:00.000+00:002011-12-02T23:15:17.581+00:00UpdateRemember that 'really quite possible first date'?<br />
<br />
Happening.<br />
<br />
Tomorrow.Livvy U.http://www.blogger.com/profile/15954289268370454513noreply@blogger.com9tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-32913072.post-62745813961067211352011-12-01T22:22:00.000+00:002011-12-01T22:22:25.226+00:00PostscriptOh the<i> </i>luxury of not <i>having</i> to post!<br />
<br />
But the eagle-eyed among you will note I have not quite managed to stay away...<br />
<br />
Readers will no doubt forgive a little slow down before working my way up to frequent posting pitch again.<br />
<br />
And a huge, heartfelt thank you to everyone who accompanied me on the NaBloPoMo journey. What a generous, big-hearted community the blogosphere is. Livvy U.http://www.blogger.com/profile/15954289268370454513noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-32913072.post-69307366139606774702011-11-30T23:58:00.001+00:002011-12-01T00:00:17.924+00:00Finale<i>I <b>have</b> to catch the 2255!</i> I shriek above the cacophany that is London traffic on a Wednesday night not long before Christmas.<br />
<br />
We are legging it, fast as we can, from Covent Garden to St Pancras to catch the hi-speed home. A fair old walk at the best of times.<br />
<br />
These central London streets that I know so well are aglow with Christmas light frippery. Every bar, every cafe, every restaurant and hotel sports its share of winking, twinkling fairy lights. It is mild and blowy, and after the elegance and gravitas of the ballet viewed from the 'gods' of the Opera House, I am crazy with life.<br />
<br />
<i>I really can't miss this train!</i> I'm thinking - and I really can't. To write twenty-nine posts in as many days, and then fall at the last fence because I can't make it home before midnight? Unthinkable!<br />
<br />
We make it with moments to spare, shouting out short-cuts, dodging day dreamers, hurtling up the escalators and into the train triumphant. We chat happily all the way and I leave my friend one stop before her own, dashing down the platform and into the car park to my car.<br />
<br />
<i>Come on, come on! </i>I berate myself when I can't find the car key, throwing the contents of my handbag onto the tarmac.<br />
<br />
It's an exhilarating, somewhat hair-raising drive home. I'm gleeful as Kent Town's own lights, tame in comparison with London's excess, fly by me on the bridge, and hold my breath as I accelerate through an amber light.<br />
<br />
The cat greets me at the door, I climb the stairs two by two, flick all the switches, press all the buttons... and here I sit in my coat, casting glances at my watch as I have done for most of my twenty-nine posts during NaBloPoMo in order to slip this final posting under the wire before midnight.<br />
<br />
The day's sore head and tension have lifted. I am filled with the possibility of all things. In the next few weeks alone life holds a house move to the new place which Anna-mouse will make our own; a really quite possible first date, and the knowledge that I can write, fast, anytime, and people want to read it. <br />
<br />
Hopeful, more hopeful than I have been in a very long time, that I have come unstuck and am free to move on.<br />
<br />
Ladies and gentlemen, thirty posts, a bow, curtain.<br />
<br />
<i><br />
</i>Livvy U.http://www.blogger.com/profile/15954289268370454513noreply@blogger.com8tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-32913072.post-30527954675037842232011-11-29T23:59:00.001+00:002011-12-01T00:46:27.944+00:00New worldsI keep starting this post and then deleting what I've written.<br />
<div><br />
</div><div>I've been wanting to muse about love, and the lovely youngish man.</div><div><br />
</div><div>But I'm tired and instead I find myself simply marvelling at what it is - I mean, what's the process? - that the human heart goes through to recover from injury and fully engage once again. It's incredible, this organ of ours. Really, I'm speechless with admiration at the human facility to suffer, recover and carry on.</div><div><br />
</div><div>And when I have a look, I see that my own recovery is far more complete than I thought it was. I guess the Summer had something to do with it: falling into a very black place, seeking the advice and solace of friends, and eventually, slowly, dragging myself out from there. </div><div><br />
</div><div>My despair was fuelled two-fold, I remember: it was sparked by my financial situation growing more and more desperate, and then the bonfire was well and truly lit by the Bim meeting his new love. It absolutely wasn't that I wanted to be with him in stead of her; it was, I later understood, that his meeting Mary left me having to face being, and feeling, completely alone.</div><div><br />
</div><div>It took longer to admit to myself that I was not only alone, but very lonely. I struggle with writing this even today. I'm not sure why I find it such a difficult thing to admit to. I suppose it's because I want to believe that I can be all things to myself, but I found myself alone in the car recently speaking my loneliness out loud for the first time, and I knew then with a heavy heart that sooner or later I would have to look for the remedy. </div><div><br />
</div><div>But then the remedy came towards me on Friday night with an open heart and huge smile and it didn't seem such a scary thing after all, re-connecting with the company of men. And yes it would be wonderful to feel that connection again - but if that doesn't happen the gift of the encounter is immense. </div><div><br />
</div><div>Suddenly, whole worlds out there have come into focus again, and I may not have to experience them alone.</div><div><br />
</div><div><br />
</div>Livvy U.http://www.blogger.com/profile/15954289268370454513noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-32913072.post-10113196742340960542011-11-28T23:35:00.000+00:002011-11-28T23:35:45.646+00:00Living the LifeI am currently too excited to think, speak, or write. <br />
<br />
It's a long time since 'Livvy's Life' was about... well, life. <br />
<br />
Real, live, happening right now Life!<br />
<br />
Can't stop.<br />
<br />
xxLivvy U.http://www.blogger.com/profile/15954289268370454513noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-32913072.post-48747475415456791912011-11-27T23:54:00.000+00:002011-11-27T23:54:30.055+00:00This WeekendThis weekend I went to market and found a five pound note.<br />
<div><br />
</div><div>This weekend I went to market and found a five pound note and a new pair of school shoes for Anna-mouse.</div><div><br />
</div><div>This weekend I went to market and found a five pound note; a new pair of school shoes for Anna-mouse and a house for us to live in.</div><div><br />
</div><div>This weekend I went to market and found a five pound note; a new pair of school shoes for Anna-mouse; a house for us to live in and an art gallery in a disused shop.</div><div><br />
</div><div>This weekend I went to market and found a five pound note; a new pair of school shoes for Anna-mouse; a house for us to live in; an art gallery in a disused shop and a lovely man inside it.</div><div><br />
</div><div>This weekend I went to market and found a five pound note; a new pair of school shoes for Anna-mouse; a house for us to live in; an art gallery in a disused shop; a lovely man inside it and a hour of conversation.</div><div><br />
</div><div>This weekend I went to market and found a five pound note; a new pair of school shoes for Anna-mouse; a house for us to live in; an art gallery in a disused shop; a lovely man inside it; an hour of conversation and a glass which was half full.</div><div><br />
</div><div>This weekend I went to market and found a five pound note; a new pair of school shoes for Anna-mouse; a house for us to live in; an art gallery in a disused shop; a lovely man inside it; an hour of conversation; a glass which was half full and two awards from fellow bloggers for my blog.<br />
<br />
This weekend I went to market and found a five pound note; a new pair of school shoes for Anna-mouse; a house for us to live in; an art gallery in a disused shop; a lovely man inside it; an hour of conversation; a glass which was half full; two awards from fellow bloggers for my blog...<br />
<br />
...and a large sign right in front of me so that I could not fail to read it which read:<br />
<i>'Livvy, you are going the right way.'</i></div>Livvy U.http://www.blogger.com/profile/15954289268370454513noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-32913072.post-42379330858476424182011-11-26T23:58:00.002+00:002011-11-27T00:07:45.708+00:00Reviewing the SurpriseQuiet. Contemplative. Retreating back into my single space for one and a small, golden-haired half. The happy, glowing bubble in which we stood to hold our conversation seems barely credible today. Did it happen like that, I want to ask?<br />
<br />
But it was important. It was momentous! The lovely youngish man I met yesterday re-introduced me to possibility: to connection: to love.<br />
<br />
Often in recent years I have looked at what I assumed to be the mountain I would have to scale even to put myself into an available space and dismissed it as unthinkable. I began to feel older, really so much older, and with sadness I recognised that the Bim had taken something intangible but necessary from me where relationships with men are concerned. Something in me shrank so small when I was lied to so many times by the person in whom I had placed my trust.<br />
<br />
So yesterday was joyous because suddenly I understood that almost without noticing it I have moved away from that position, and there wasn't a mountain to climb at all! Instead, there was a clear flat open plain with a beautiful horizon to navigate, and all I had to do was decide to step onto it, which I did, when I persuaded myself to enter the gallery alone.<br />
<br />
It is possible I may never see the lovely youngish man again. It would be a shame that the obvious connection we both felt would not be explored, but it would not be a tragedy.<br />
<br />
Loving another person is such a brave thing to decide to do. Yesterday evening, for the first time in almost a decade, I was allowed to remember how the very first steps to that decision feel. What I was reminded is that sometimes you don't have to spend an ounce of energy making the decision at all. Sometimes, if you simply choose to take it, the way is clear.<br />
<br />
I began to believe, then. That love... is a possibility.Livvy U.http://www.blogger.com/profile/15954289268370454513noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-32913072.post-37570158266684183272011-11-25T23:58:00.003+00:002011-11-26T11:07:27.493+00:00SurpriseI was tired. I dragged myself there. My friend the Poet was one of the artists exhibiting; Anna-mouse was happily ensconced with her favourite playdate playmate, and the Bim was all lined up to pick her up, so I had no excuse <i>not</i> to go.<br />
<br />
I sighed and gave myself a team-talk as I neared the place: <i>Come on, Liv, you can do it...</i><i> </i>Arriving at social events alone is never the nicest.<br />
<br />
I kept my eyes peeled for the Poet and found him glowing and happy in suit and purple tie. I relaxed, and was handed a non-alcoholic beer. And then someone was walking towards me with a huge smile, as if we were old friends, and I thought yes, I met you once, I've no idea where, but I'll play along. He knew who I was, though, and we simply began to talk.<br />
<br />
What can I tell you? How shall I put it? Surpisingly, utterly unexpectedly and in an utterly unlooked for way, this person changed the picture. The life picture. My life picture. Just by standing there and talking and appearing to be interested in what I was saying, and wanting to know more.<br />
<br />
At one point the Poet asked me to say hello to his wife at the other end of the gallery, as they were about to leave. Reluctantly I did as I was told, and I left my coat there saying I was coming back, and when I looked some ten minutes later, there he was, waiting for me, and I returned to the same spot as before, and with a <i>Hello again</i> the conversation resumed.<br />
<br />
Eventually, I had to leave. I was supposed to be cooking Anna-m's supper. I could only think she must be very hungry, but it wasn't worrying me like it normally would.<br />
<br />
I said I had to go. I said his name and said what a pleasure it had been talking to him. I wondered how we would say goodbye. He made it easy by stepping into a brief hug. I thought, I like the way his body feels.<br />
<br />
Driving home, stopped at the traffic lights, I burst into sad-happy tears.Livvy U.http://www.blogger.com/profile/15954289268370454513noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-32913072.post-4425989564363163662011-11-24T23:20:00.000+00:002011-11-24T23:20:46.551+00:00House HuntingI am looking for a house. The one I live in now is sold. If all goes to plan, I am supposed to be moving out in three weeks time. I won't go into the financial contortions that have brought me to this point. Suffice to say that the immediacy of the move dawned on me with force today, now that <a href="http://livvylife.blogspot.com/2011/11/deadline.html" target="_blank">The Deadline</a> is over for another month.<br />
<br />
Yes, I agree, it's quite astonishing I've barely mentioned my imminent move in (quick fanfare) twenty-three straight days of blogging.<br />
<br />
The house that I'm looking for will be up for rent. The house I live in I own. Well, I jointly own this house with the Bim. I won't be owning the house I'm looking for, it's to do with the aforementioned contortions. No, I'll be renting that one.<br />
<br />
I did go to see two houses for rent about a week ago. I fell in love with the first one. I suspected I was going to when the property details described it as a 'one-off'. You know something's up with a house when they describe it as a one-off. A 'house with character', they said. A one-off house with character: someone like me (who wouldn't mind being similarly labelled) is going to fall in love with that, now aren't they?<br />
<br />
It was the quirkiest house I have ever seen. <br />
<br />
<i>It's an odd shape, isn't it,</i> I said to the painter putting the finishing touches to the triangular sitting-room. <br />
<br />
<i>Ah, </i>he said knowledgeably, <i>that's because it's a wedge.</i><br />
<i><br />
</i><br />
Trust me to fall in love with a wedge. He was right, though: the house had been wedged in between two others, like a slice of pizza. Most of the rooms were triangular-shaped, or some other shape whose name I should have learned in Geometry. It would have been useful, living there, for helping with Anna-m's homework. ('Mum, is this an isoceles or a scalene triangle?' 'I don't know, darling, go and have a look at the bathroom').<br />
<br />
So anyway, I said yes I'd like to live in this wedge but the landlord cast his vote some other way: probably something to do with the financial contortions and not being able to prove that it has been me, not the Bim, paying the mortgage on our house for years.<br />
<br />
The lettings agent, a fierce young man whose untruths I recognised because of my stirling practise with the Bim, took me to see another house as balm for not winning the first one. I was so disappointed that I wasn't going to have to grapple with wedge-shape problems like how I was going to fit my rectangular furniture into the triangular sitting-room, that I couldn't appreciate the second house he showed me. I walked around it, yes, and everything about it suggested that life would be easier there than living in the wedge, but I was heartbroken to have to settle for a conventional second best, and said no, I don't want to live here, thank you.<br />
<br />
Today something made me drive to the second house again. I got out and peered through the window and thought <i>Perhaps I could live here. </i>When I got home I called the fierce young man and made an appointment to take Anna-mouse to see it on Saturday. <br />
<br />
I'm looking for a house.Livvy U.http://www.blogger.com/profile/15954289268370454513noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-32913072.post-66147360960243144792011-11-23T23:56:00.000+00:002011-11-23T23:56:59.600+00:00Just ImagineThe house has that more quiet than quiet feeling it always has near midnight when Anna-mouse is not sleeping in it. Strange, on a school night. I guess this is how it would be if tonight's venture were successful. <i>Rehearsals two or three times a week</i>, it said on the letter telling me that my first audition had been successful and asking me to attend a recall; and whole days leading up to the big night itself.<br />
<br />
Logistically, if I'm successful, it could be a nightmare. But I'm working on the principle that I don't need to worry about this until I get the email, which is how they will tell us in six to eight weeks' time, saying 'join us'. The Bim taught me that one. He never worries about anything he doesn't <i>have</i> to worry about (and sometimes not even then). So when I said <i>It'd be difficult, you know, if this works out</i>, he waved away my caution, told me we'd work it out, and that we wouldn't worry about it until it happens. And I know that the reason he is like this is because he does actually understand what it would mean to me. I've always loved that about the Bim: his ability to be on my side.<br />
<br />
So here I sit at a quarter to midnight, my body humming with tonight's paces. My skin is warm and my hair is wet because I've just had a bath to minimise the aches I'm bound to have tomorrow morning. There's nothing like this feeling, especially having sat at the computer for days on end. I used to have this feeling all the time, during my dancing days. It suits me, it makes me more... me. Everything tingling, everything alive.<br />
<br />
Just <i>imagine</i> what I would feel if my recall audition tonight were successful!<br />
<br />
Two hundred and forty-six days from now I would be in the Stadium, performing in the Opening Ceremony of the Olympic Games.Livvy U.http://www.blogger.com/profile/15954289268370454513noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-32913072.post-46979564648839593042011-11-22T23:49:00.000+00:002011-11-22T23:49:22.195+00:00DeadlineIt is on these days, these crazy mayhem deadline days, that I know for absolute sure that I, Livvy, am alive and well and truly kicking. On these days I wake already writing in my head, and writing all the time I am making breakfast for Anna-mouse and fussing over her packed lunch and walking her up the hill to school.<br />
<br />
By the time I get back to the house I have taught myself (it's taken a year) to ignore the beds, the washing-up, the washing and simply make a coffee on the stove, turn on the computer and... start. This is a true triumph, for me, over procrastination, which has stalked me in the form of a housewife with a wagging finger for years. The house, well yes, it's a tip. But I'm being creative! More than that, I'm doing the self-made job I dreamed up exactly one year ago. Okay so it's not making me any money yet but oh! On days like today, when the cogs were whirring and the phones were going and the keyboard was click, click clicking with my words - who cares?<br />
<br />
No that's too flippant. I do care, actually, that although my venture is a massive critical success, it is not feeding myself and Anna-mouse. It is what drives me, the will to succeed with this financially in a way that I have not experienced before.<br />
<br />
That psychic I went to, you know, that one I saw in Ireland the week I met the Bim. She always said, sideways out of her cheroot-smoking mouth, that the second half of my life would be successful. The first had held much unhappiness, she said (I couldn't help but nod, although I was trying not to give too much away to allow her to do her psychic thing), but the <i>second</i> - well! She had to light another cheroot and pace the room with it, my cards were that exciting.<br />
<br />
Now although that was ten years ago, give or take, I am willing, on days like today, when the blood was racing with the thrill of meeting my self-imposed deadline, to believe her.Livvy U.http://www.blogger.com/profile/15954289268370454513noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-32913072.post-81283813973754358502011-11-21T23:58:00.001+00:002011-11-22T00:16:55.834+00:00Keeping the PeaceSeveral times in recent days I have had the Bim's new love Mary sitting beside me in my car as I drive her to work and continue on to drop Anna-mouse off at school.<br />
<br />
Yes, I know, it's a little unusual.<br />
<br />
In my defence, if I didn't perform this morning task, Mary wouldn't get to work, Anna-m wouldn't get to school, and, crucially, I would not be able to have the evening off the night before said morning <a href="http://livvylife.blogspot.com/2011/11/bar.html" target="_blank">to swan off to London hotels</a> because Anna-mouse stays with the Bim in his new village abode on such nights. Clear?<br />
<br />
I've always been a peacemaker. I think it comes of being the middle child. I remember vividly being placed on the (very uncomfortable) middle half-seat on the back seat of our family car, to ensure my brother on one side and my sister on the other did not fight. I attempted to broker peace between my father and sister through all the years they did not talk to one another and I will always try to see the other person's point of view.<br />
<br />
This has not, it has to be said, always stood me in good stead. Sometimes I see the other person's point of view so clearly that it cripples me. <br />
<br />
In the case of Mary, this is not so. But it does raise some questions as I bob along with her beside me in the car. Like: how much <i>should</i> you impart to your husband's new love about your husband?<br />
<br />
This question amuses me frequently. I mean, <i>I know so much that might be of use!</i><br />
<i><br />
</i><br />
It's all fantasy, I know, but it does cheer me as I perform my taxi task, to assemble a list of Things I Know That You Don't Which Might Save Your Relationship. Chief among these are:<br />
<br />
(1) Do not, on any account, open a joint bank account with my husband (and always stash a little bit away that he can't get at).<br />
(2) If he looks at you as if you are stark raving bonkers when you ask him a direct question about something in his behaviour you don't understand and vehemently denies all knowledge, he is unquestionably lying and you need to communicate about this straightaway.<br />
(3) The Bim is married already - yes, to me, but also to his family.<br />
<br />
Oh, and (4) He is not a bad person, in fact he is a good one who has a good, big heart. But keep a generous portion of your own safe for a while, won't you. You never know when you might need it.<br />
<br />
I say none of this, of course. I remain steadfastly - one might even say stoically - stum.Livvy U.http://www.blogger.com/profile/15954289268370454513noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-32913072.post-77447214719201684132011-11-20T23:57:00.001+00:002011-11-20T23:59:37.808+00:00Sunday LondonLondon, ah my London, looked splendid today. I was lucky enough to arrive early enough to find the city still shaking off sleep. The streets had been cleaned of Saturday night, many places had not yet opened their doors to Sunday shoppers, the theatres on Shaftesbury Avenue were closed for their one night of rest and I strode with a bounce in my booted step towards the cinema showing the cast and crew screening of the movie we made earlier this year.<br />
<br />
When I emerged a couple of hours later, happy and relieved that I had done myself enough credit on screen not to worry about sending people to see it, I strolled down to Piccadilly, losing myself in the crowds and soaking up the city centre streets I know so well.<br />
<br />
Every corner spoke to me of former times: of the young me; of nights with loved ones; of days with the baby Anna-m; of early moments with the Bim; of evenings in the company of friends. I wandered the streets like a tourist with deja vue: Trafalgar Square (proclaiming that there were only 250 days, 3 hours, 29 minutes and 16 seconds to go to the start of the London Olympics!); Whitehall; the Embankment; Westminster Bridge; Waterloo.<br />
<br />
I took out my mobile phone and took photographs at every turn. Remnants of the morning fog misted the watery sun. The Thames was splendid with life.<br />
<br />
Oh London, my London. To say I miss you is not quite so. You're so part of me I can live you when I'm not near.Livvy U.http://www.blogger.com/profile/15954289268370454513noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-32913072.post-20130291129050015542011-11-19T23:28:00.000+00:002011-11-19T23:28:59.015+00:00Drawing a BlankLet me see... Tum te dum...<div><div><br />
</div><div>Nope. </div><div><br />
</div><div>Nothing.</div><div><br />
</div><div>Really not.</div><div><br />
</div><div>Livvy is, officially, unable to post every day.</div><div><br />
</div><div>Back tomorrow xx</div></div>Livvy U.http://www.blogger.com/profile/15954289268370454513noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-32913072.post-13704455009411919332011-11-18T15:08:00.000+00:002011-11-18T15:08:06.352+00:00Working, aloneThree in the afternoon. The low winter sun is filtering through the blinds of the spare room where I work. The day is... quiet. Long. I am supposed to be working - and indeed have been working - but I have become slower and slower, like a wind-up toy whose battery is running out.<br />
<br />
I realise that what is lacking for me today, in fact what is lacking for me most days, is a sounding board. I have no-one to talk to. Because I work from home at this new venture of mine, and because today I have no meetings, no networking and no delivering, and because I am not even picking up Anna-mouse from school (to give me, ironically, more time to work in order to save me from ploughing on into the small hours tonight), I have not spoken to a living soul since I dropped her off this morning.<br />
<br />
If I had an office elsewhere, or if I worked with others, or if I had a partner perhaps, this would not be so.<br />
<br />
It's difficult, being my own sounding board. It's difficult encouraging myself to go on. Today is Friday, and I'd like to curl up in front of the television under Anna-mouse's blue and white checked blanket. Or, I'd like to take a break and meet someone in the kitchen as I wait for the kettle to boil. We'd have, you know, an inconsequential chat, one which would take my mind off the enormous task at hand and return me to it refreshed and re-energised, simply because I have engaged for a few moments with another human being.<br />
<br />
Or, I'd like to talk with someone who knows what I'm talking about. Have that kind of conversation where I can savour the tiniest detail of my project with another, rolling the ideas around like fine wine to extract the slightest nuance of flavour. I'd like to sound off my ideas, laugh at my absurdities and check my decisions against someone who would say yes, that's right, or no, think of it another way...<br />
<br />
I'm sure self-employed people the world over suffer from this self-imposed solitariness. And to go the whole way with the picture, it is made worse for me knowing that that person is not going to appear at the end of the working day, either. <br />
<br />
There won't be anyone in the kitchen making tea tonight but me.<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
Livvy U.http://www.blogger.com/profile/15954289268370454513noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-32913072.post-12059099229121680782011-11-17T19:48:00.001+00:002011-11-18T14:32:20.133+00:00Giving InThe pain behind my left eye which has plagued me for days is worsening, the light of the computer monitor is shrieking at me, the burden of just too many responsibilities in different areas of life are weighing me down and the week's accumulative lack of sleep has at last caught up with me. <br />
<br />
I'm going to give in, turn off the computer, take some painkillers and go to bed at the same time as Anna-mouse. I might even let her sleep in my bed, a once-a-week treat usually reserved for Fridays. I'll pretend it's for her, but really it will be for me. Nothing like the sleeping form of your own child beside you.Livvy U.http://www.blogger.com/profile/15954289268370454513noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-32913072.post-26971027078638645282011-11-16T23:43:00.000+00:002011-11-16T23:43:54.822+00:00BarThe Gilbert Scott bar at the <a href="http://www.marriott.co.uk/hotels/travel/lonpr-st-pancras" target="_blank">St Pancras Renaissance Hotel</a> is a very good place to drink a glass of champagne. <br />
<br />
If you sit on the high stools at the bar, like we did, you can watch the cocktails mixed in front of you. Intriguing fizzing concoctions are swiftly assembled in glass jars and swizzed about with twisted silver sticks by barmen in starched white uniform. Huge, differently sized bells hang the lights from the extravagantly painted ceiling, and my friend has heard that nothing in the bar is attached to the walls, including the bar itself, due to the listed nature of this extraordinary, painstakingly restored Victorian building. One wonders fleetingly about all the silver and glass and mirrors crashing somehow down, and then of course the thought disappears in the fuzzy glow cast by the table lamps, the champagne, and the solicitous nature of the staff.<br />
<br />
It's good to take a sip of opulence every once in a while.Livvy U.http://www.blogger.com/profile/15954289268370454513noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-32913072.post-46905871220465433832011-11-15T21:02:00.000+00:002011-11-15T21:02:04.090+00:00The Nub of ThingsIt was early in the morning. We'd had a little skirmish over her new karate suit, onto which I was trying to sew in a bleary-eyed fashion three cloth badges. Apparently I sewed the one on the sleeve the wrong way round. As it was in Chinese, it was hard to tell, but Anna-mouse was up in arms. She had a good shout, flung herself off the bed where I was sewing, and hurtled into her bedroom.<br />
<br />
A few moments later she re-appeared with some magnetic words from a poetry kit and began to stick them to the radiator.<br />
<br />
The first wonky line of words read:<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">mum dad and me now</div><div style="text-align: center;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: left;">Then she went back to the bedroom to find more words, and when she came back took the 'dad' from the above and placed it in the second line:</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: center;">I see you but no dad</div><div style="text-align: center;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: left;">And then she went into the bedroom, found two more words and returned with these and a photograph of the Bim and his son, her greatly missed half-brother who lives in Ireland. She pointed at the photograph, and then stuck up her final two words:</div><div style="text-align: left;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: center;">him too</div><div style="text-align: center;"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh9u0qADLc0AiSY4RiLeGWt7S1nRicjCvaa1GFV8KovuYOtKMukNwazym0d7DuUke5NLaMKL6slaER9Dmp-YGaxGSfv-EwdX_6BGABfSQYfQ9gA91POvM7Zkt9Nc6F6bnRF9gvo/s1600/IMAG0154.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="191" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh9u0qADLc0AiSY4RiLeGWt7S1nRicjCvaa1GFV8KovuYOtKMukNwazym0d7DuUke5NLaMKL6slaER9Dmp-YGaxGSfv-EwdX_6BGABfSQYfQ9gA91POvM7Zkt9Nc6F6bnRF9gvo/s320/IMAG0154.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><div style="text-align: left;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: left;">I have left it there all day, her short, eloquent expression of the nub of things.</div><div style="text-align: center;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: center;"><br />
</div>Livvy U.http://www.blogger.com/profile/15954289268370454513noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-32913072.post-85698424952331519052011-11-14T22:26:00.000+00:002011-11-14T22:26:11.083+00:00DominoesI love playing dominoes. I love everything about them. I love the sleek, cool pieces. Tiles, they call them. I love turning them in my hand. I love the way our set of tiles comes in an old-fashioned metal tin. I love that once you have chosen your initial tiles and placed them in a strategically defensive line before you, backs to the other players, the superfluous ivory oblongs are put into a pile called the Bone Yard.<br />
<br />
I was reminded of all this when Anna-mouse announced that I had to play a game with her while the bath was running tonight. We played on the floor, hugging the heater, because true to form with this house my heating isn't working. It was quite cosy on the carpet round the corner of the bed, which acted as a kind of draught-shield. <br />
<br />
Immediately I fell into contemplation mode, which is another reason I like playing dominoes: it calms me. It calms Anna-mouse, too, something we discovered with surprise the summer she first played the game, at the time of her fifth birthday. <br />
<br />
It was, in fact, the most difficult summer of all - the first after the Bim left the family home. In one of the many bizarre acts of love and ridiculousness which this separation of ours has engendered, we felt duty bound to honour a longstanding, pre-split booking to take Anna-m to see a performance of Chitty Chitty Bang Bang in its live stage show incarnation, which was touring the UK at the time. Given that we live in Kent, readers will understand that it was no small commitment to honour, given that the nearest performance to us was in Devon.<br />
<br />
So we booked two rooms in a Bed & Breakfast - a room for Anna-m and me, and one for the Bim - in a strange coastal village across the border in Cornwall. <br />
<br />
It was there that our weekend, which was understandably fraught with tension, was considerably mollified by the gift to Anna-m by the owners of the B&B of a small wooden box of dominoes. Suddenly we discovered something which could unite us, something which brought all of us to a state of calm - one might even say grace. I remember sitting round a little fold-up table in the Bim's room, munching snacks and taking long, weighty moments to consider the placing of my next tile.<br />
<br />
It was a revelation to us that for the first time our feisty just-five year old chose to abide by the rules of a game with no fuss; indeed took the thing entirely to heart. The July rain slapped the salted windows of the B&B as we played on, oblivious, and we emerged from those games purged, somehow, of our many and various sins. <br />
<br />
I was reminded of this tonight. I was reminded how much I love playing dominoes.Livvy U.http://www.blogger.com/profile/15954289268370454513noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-32913072.post-31656792282899502382011-11-13T22:42:00.002+00:002011-11-14T22:29:33.961+00:00Keeping it SimpleWhen the Bim escaped Kent Town with his new love Mary a few weeks ago, it was to a little village about seven miles away. A different world. A good move. And after comforting Anna-mouse through several anxious pre-move nights, it was thankfully a move that has proved popular with her, too.<br />
<br />
One of the things the Bim and I tried to do after we separated was to give Anna-mouse the odd day out, when he she and I did something together as the family that we used to be. These occasions were often bitter-sweet, usually pretty successful, and only once or twice too painful for words.<br />
<br />
Since Mary and the Bim have made a life together, these occasions have tailed off, but yesterday, with Mary out of town, the three of us found ourselves together almost by accident, attending the village hall's fifty year anniversary fete.<br />
<br />
It was a sweet, gentle affair straight out of the 1940s, in a traditional little hall with wooden rafters. Tables manned by locals lined the walls offering raffles, tombolas and craftsy activities for the children. My favourite was a free stall manned by a local gardener, fingernails black with compost, who was showing any child who would listen how to plant up daffodil bulbs for the spring.<br />
<br />
The Bim and I were almost superfluous to the wealth of opportunities for kids, and found ourselves standing about chatting as Anna-mouse decorated a CD turned candle holder with glitter, and strung up a necklace. This last activity was run by the local vicar, a compact young man with prematurely greying hair and fraying dog collar. He got talking to the Bim, who told him how 'we' had just moved into the village, and because appearances deceive and with no reason to believe otherwise, the young man assumed of course that I was part of the 'we'.<br />
<br />
<i>How strange this is</i>, I thought. Everything apparently the way it was, and yet actually not at all.<br />
<br />
I don't mind, I just don't know what to feel when people mistake us for the happy family we are not, which, to our credit, happens more often than not. We have flummoxed teachers at Anna-m's school by our united front, and mothers of Anna-mouse's friends have been astounded when I say no, we're not together. We haven't been together for years.<br />
<br />
As we were leaving the fete, the three of us laden with Anna-mouse's spoils and laughing at her dalmatian face painting, a woman caught up in our happy atmosphere stopped to ask us if we were attending the evening's concert. There were two tickets left, she said, but then I suppose you'd have to get a baby sitter, and it is short notice... And then she invited us to attend the family prayer meetings, designed especially for families with children like us and run by the nice young man with the dog collar, on a Wednesday evening. Without even glancing at each other to corroborate our stories, the Bim and I played the part to save her feelings and went on our way. <i>Welcome to the village!</i> she called after us.<br />
<br />
Well, what could we have said?<br />
<br />
<i>No, sorry, you've got it wrong - this </i>is<i> my husband, this </i>is<i> my child, but I did not move into the village last week. My husband moved here with his new love. My daughter stays here at weekends. This weekend my husband's new love has gone back to see her children. Yes, quite complicated! We are still married, but we're going to get divorced. Quite soon now, actually. No, that's all right, I know what it looks like. We just decided, for our daughter, that we'd be friends. At all costs. Yes. </i>Livvy U.http://www.blogger.com/profile/15954289268370454513noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-32913072.post-74293839018541258532011-11-12T23:52:00.001+00:002011-11-13T00:01:34.928+00:00NaBloPoMo Reality CheckSo here we are at last. I've hit it. On this, the twelfth day of attempting to post every day for a month, I really, really don't want to write. <br />
<br />
Bless my higher self for making me show up grumbling at the page.<br />
<br />
Here's the thing: I don't write a tech-y blog. I'm not a geek. I'm not a cook who posts recipes. I'm not a Yummy Mummy, though I am a mother. I'm not a scrapbooker, photographer or maker. I'm not a farmer or a woman who has moved countries and blogs about that. <br />
<br />
I'm a Livvy, and what I write about is me. Today I have discovered that some days I want to remain private. It's my Saturday-night-in night, my one very alone night of the week, and my thoughts are many, and ranging, and they run deep. I don't want to mine them tonight.<br />
<br />
<i>And </i> I have a terrible suspicion that because I am writing many of my posts very quickly, in order to get them date-stamped before midnight, the quality of the writing is beginning to suffer. And God knows, it's hard for me to offer up anything less than my best - it pains me (and probably holds me back immeasurably in life).<br />
<br />
So tonight I'm having a rant at my decision to do this thing - at the same time as knowing that NaBloPoMo veterans could well say that this is the very moment that I must keep going. <br />
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And just because I'm bloody-minded, and because doing this is all part of the bigger 'make Livvy's life happier' project, I'm damn well going to.Livvy U.http://www.blogger.com/profile/15954289268370454513noreply@blogger.com7tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-32913072.post-41365694007003598622011-11-11T23:58:00.004+00:002011-11-12T00:05:06.229+00:00Things of NoteThey say that writers are supposed to notice things. Currently I'm noticing that it is twenty-three minutes to midnight, and that unless I write something very fast I won't have a blog post for this day at all. And for <a href="http://www.blogher.com/blogher-topics/blogging-social-media/nablopomo" target="_blank">NaBloPoMo</a>, that just won't do.<br />
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So I thought I'd write about what I've noticed, today:<br />
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On my drive over to the sailing barge this afternoon, I noticed that my friend the Poet can't bear to colour a conversation with silence. He must talk through the quiet, and as he becomes more voluble, I make the silences for us both. After a while I crave it, and sometimes I even tell him to stop talking. Luckily, because we like one another so much, he doesn't mind. Today he'd been wittering on for a while when he stopped abruptly and said <i>I'm talking too much again, aren't I?</i> I noticed that <i>he's </i>noticed...<br />
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On our drive over to the sailing barge I also noticed the Kentish countryside, and how the ancient trees struck jagged shapes on the horizon in the mist. The colours were khaki and willow green and every shade of brown. I noticed how that horizon soothed me as we drove.<br />
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I noticed too how flat the water was in the little inlet where the barge is moored, as if the water would move as one, like a plate, if I had waded in and given it a push.<br />
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I noticed how cosy it was inside the barge; how warm the stove makes it once lit; how much I like my connection with the family who run the place. <br />
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This evening I noticed how lean the Bim is now compared to when we first met. How much older he looks, how he has lost his baby face for good.<br />
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I noticed for the umpteenth time how beautiful Anna-mouse's golden hair is, and how well she threw together her clothes for going to the cinema and how she will be a faster reader than myself, because she naturally skips the unimportant words on the page.<br />
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I noticed a lightness in me, all day, because yesterday I did something out of the ordinary, and today I faced a few, small fears. <br />
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These things I noticed, and more.Livvy U.http://www.blogger.com/profile/15954289268370454513noreply@blogger.com3