Friday I wake up and find that I am still fight the battle of a bad gut and a sore and still purple bruised set of toes, so once again I spend the day with my foot being iced and practising the latrine two step to the loo. It does not sound much of an existence but oddly as I laze around craving plain and binding food, I update information into my new daily running journal and acquire a new ISA. The later at the suggestion of my partner who shrewdly pointed out that 4.25% is a lot more then 2.2%. The logic is in the arithmetic the anxiety is in the not quite believing that all this magic can be done on a Smart phone, but it was and magically a new entry appeared on my banking page.
I was able to do some holiday planning with the aid of my new note making App that has a list creation function on it. I just type in random stuff and press a button and it gets turned into a “to do” list. Its brilliant if only I had had this when I was working and being a manager, life would have been even easier. Any way the day passed with odd moments of joy amongst the other stuff, like my denim design crocs arriving, which I hope my bruised toes will appreciate in due course. The good news is that they did.
The evening coms around and there is a football match to watch, England in the World Cup qualifiers against the might of Albania. England manage a professional but deeply boring 2-0 win, and with that I take my meds, give my hand operation scars on last Nivea creaming of the day, don my finger splint and magic gel dressing and go to bed, hoping that my felling of physical emptiness is a signal that my gut is finally settling down.
Saturday arrives and today is supposed to be day out at the States of Independence literary festival at the local university. I make a tentative start to the day by taking my vitals ( all good) and getting myself down to the local pharmacy to try and collect the medications I tried to order on Wednesday. The timing is all a bit tight. As I feared my prescription is not ready but when I explain my situation of needing my injection to come back to on Monday week, as I am going away for a week, they check to see if they can order it for today. They come back and tell me it out of stock, the supplier does not have any. This is bad news as it is a medication that comes in from the EU and is my mainstay cancer drug. I have at least one of these injections stashed away so I will be alright on the Monday I need it, but it triggers fears about the supply chain not working. Its an anxiety I’ve not had before but I am aware that other people with similar conditions have experienced difficulties getting their medications when this disruption happens.
I return home empty handed and eat toast and marmalade determined not to panic. My partner and I get ready and we drive into town to the States of Independence book festival at the university.
We arrive, me with a bag tight with copies of my poetry collections, well you never know. We tick ourselves in and begin to roam the stalls of book sellers, self publishers and publishers. I meet someone I know from the poetry stanza who is looking after the local writers group stall. To start with I am a bit bemused it feels like a craft fair but with books, it could easily be a a 3P affair, (Pick up, Put down and Piss off) experience but I get talking to some people about what they do and I find some that do what the Americans do for me. I show them my books like a child going “look what I’ve done” and they say they can do what the Americans have been doing for me but a lot cheaper. I am interested and take their details. They suggested an anthology, which is an intriguing though but at the moment I think I just want to test the water with a new Cancer Years collection.
Time for the first presentation of the day and my partner and I choose to go and see one about how the University writers course had researched, written and illustrated a graphic novel of seven stories based on Leicester folklore. It had students and professionals there talking about their roles and a snippet of video explaining the project. There was some interesting bits in it, but I am not sure how taking a Indian folk tale and translating it into a modern day story set in Leicester so as to reflect the nature of the city is quite reflecting the folklore of Leicester rather than creating new stuff, but there you go that me.
Our next session saw us in the headline session with Anthony Joseph being interviewed and reading his poetry. He was very entertaining and interesting having been a musician first then a poet and also a novelist. My partners comment was that she could listen to his voice all day and it is true he had a rich and relaxed voice. It was a good session, its always good to see poetry being brought alive by being read, especially by some one who has a good “voice”. When I Look a the notes I made (yes of course I did!) I note that I have written “What a fucking necklace! This refers to the huge bead affair that was hung around her neck. Spectacular is the word.
After a lunch time sandwich we go back to the festival and attend another session by a block called Rob Duncan who has aphantasia, not that being aphantasic is something that you have more something you are. Aphantasia is the inability to form mental images of objects that are not present. Rob Duncan is a writer so he did a work shop on how he creates a visual world for people when he cannot create a visual world of his own . In effect he creates things for people to see in the their “minds eye” when he does not have one. Too this end he has developed “rules”, more like guidelines on how to construct a description that will do the job, understanding that everyone who reads it will create their own “minds eye” version of it. He got us all to pick up a key from the desk and then to apply the formulae to it and some brave people read what they had written. You apparently give a general location (environmental context) and then add a small visual detail followed by another sense fact in the environment. It was quite fun to do as we were encouraged to expand it if we had time. (it was a very short exercise). Here is mine:
“In the nursery on a winter’s day, dim and baby powder smelling, the key protruded from the box of magic treats. Only the nanny, tall and bleach clean, was allowed to dispense the treats. A vile tasting potion to keep a tiny soul alive.”
Having seen the session through we had a quick break and moved onto the Open Mike session where people had pre booked to read a poem or two. We sat and listened to several people read their poems, some good, some indifferent and some rathe lovely. Mostly connecting the poet to the work, so the really creepy guy who read his poem about a breast pump was put down as just strange. The Mexican woman who write a cautionary poem about her kind were out and about and not to be messed with was good. When all the signed up poets had read a couple of extras got up. I could not resist despite being nervous. I had been struck by how flat or monotone most of the reading had been so I decided that I would go with my ye ha poem “God bless America” a celebration poem of getting my first collection published in the USA. I hope I was suitably energetic and ye ha, but it only struck me half way through that there might be a sense of not wishing to bless America in the room with this audience. I was clapped politely . With the fun over we returned home.
It had been a tiring but interesting experience and I just sat in front of the TV and watched rugby and football. The evening passed with watching more stuff before going through my night rituals, taking my meds and going to bed quite early.
Sunday, I am up and finishing packing for the holiday. Last minute checks done and odd things stuffed into nooks and crannies of various bags. The car gets packed and then that point of no return comes. My partner and I get in an we are off. I know this route, M69, M6, M42, M5, J27 follow the sign posts to Barnstable, then Bideford and finally Westwood Ho! Of course I use my phone maps for the last bit but we arrive via one pee stop and a sandwich at about twenty to four. The car is unpacked and I am knackered. My first thought is to see if the ice ream van adn the ocean are still here as I remember them from last time. They are!
My partner and I are both hungry so my Country Kitchen to see if it is open, it is and we book a table for 6 o’clock. It is literally less than five minutes walk away so we arrive, check in and are shown to our table by a sweet and diminutive waitress. No. 19 our table. The menu is explained to us, we order small glasses of wine and a start after which we will attack the carvery. The starter is huge, pate, so we do as we were in structed and have a rest before getting to the multi-meated carvery. I indulge in roast beef and all the trimmings with additional roast spuds and mustard. It is what my old grandfather would have called a proper “blow out”. It was was just what I an my partner needed after the journey. We waddled back to the apartment absolutely podged. However once the jeans were off and we had watched an episode of Protection there was room for a coffee and a few After Eight mints. Tiredness won in the end, it always does, and my partner went to bed followed shortly by me after I had dug out all the things I need to go to bed with. So with my meds in me and my finger splint strapped to my hand I finally flop in to a strange bed with the sound of the sea somewhere in my ears.
