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Ah nuts. Haven’t finished the book. And didn’t make much progress today (in terms of word count anyway). I am still trying to iron out some issues with what I’ve done already and came up with an idea for a slight change of emphasis which I am hoping might work.
It will all be OK. This is not the worst shape I’ve been in as I’ve heard the whooshing of a deadline passing by.
I think we had our first people in the house since lockdown this morning when a couple of electricians turned up to update our fuse board. We managed to social distance and we didn’t really have to interact with them much, but I felt like Miranda in the Tempest, overexcited by the first men who crossed my path. Oh Brave New World, I said to them, but they didn’t get the reference. Or hear it. Because I said it in my mind (I can do words). You’d think they could have read it in my mind.
Walking the dog up the hill tonight in the evening sunshine, looking at the moon out in the day, like a confused owl (I thought I’d blogged about my daughter talking about the moon on our Sunday walk, but can’t see it now, so I must be going mad) and wondering whether in half a century my kids will look up and see cities and lights up there and rockets taking off into space from space stations (and whether you’d even be able to see that - as I discussed with my daughter the moon is a long way away). I saw four women working the fields up ahead. They were clearing up horse shit and putting it in a wheelbarrow and dumping it in a pile. They seemed cheerful in this work. Imagine just walking round a field and picking up rubbish and trying to put it in a pile.
One of them spilled her load to the amusement of her friends.
The countryside is ace.
My daughter has mastered sarcasm. When I came down from the snooker tonight her mum asked me to check on her. Phoebe had been up late watching telly with her mum.
I opened the door and she turned to look at me.
"Sorry, I was just checking you were asleep," I said.
“Well I was, but I am not now. So thanks.”
She had been awake before I opened the door in truth, but I appreciated her sass.
I anticipated more time of being my daughter’s hero before she turned on me. As it turned out she’s seen through me since day one and always treated me with the disrespect I deserve. Hopefully I will be around when she finally decides that I wasn’t so bad after all. But it means living for at least another 30 years. Which cannot be guaranteed.
