Kate, thank you for sharing this piece, both in the first draft version and this one. It was moving and made me emotional in more than one way. I loved the added bits. I am sorry for this huge loss and thank you for creating these words from it. I was intrigued the beginning what could be behind Dog's behaviour and behind how much you tell others about it. I would not have guessed.
For some time now I’ve been feeling restless and a bit dissatisfied, kind of stuck in a rut of retirement that I have made too comfortable for myself. At first I just loved the freedom of not having the long travel to and from work and my days mapped out for me. Having the freedom to pursue my hobbies of writing and art. But recently I have felt an internal tapping inside of me and I am trying to figure out what it is trying to say.
Then something happened at the weekend that made me feel young and alive once again. My son and his friends had organised a music festival not too far from where we live and asked if we could pick up some of his friends from the train station and take them there, pop in and say hello. So we did and with a tiny car stuffed full of large backpacks we set out to find the festival. Following bright coloured bunting we drove down an unmade track, the undercarriage of the car sounding in great pain, as though it was about to collapse, along with my swearing husband who was driving and not very happy about it! Bumping along we passed black and white dappled cows, who watched us with their large sleepy eyes in a very uninterested way whilst chewing the cud. Eventually we came to a clearing which opened up into a wall of bright ribbons blowing in the breeze. Music was playing and young people milled around chatting whilst holding drinks, whilst others were helping each other set up their tents. I stood taking it all in and felt as though I had arrived on the set of ‘A Midsummer Night’s Dream’, expecting a Shakespearean character to appear at any moment. My son greeted us with hugs and introduced us to his friend. My husband quickly suggested we go home. It is an old family joke that whenever we arrive anywhere, we say, “Shall we go now?” I was offered a glass of wine, “You can have one when you get home”, he said. I ignored him and accepted it and started chatting and after a while my husband joined in. I had such a lovely time, hearing about their lives and was surprised how interested they were in us ‘oldies’. Sorry, but I find so many older people are only interested in talking about themselves. Maybe I am one, I hope not.
Finally, after being immune to my husband’s nudging, I agreed to go home. I left the wood on a high with renewed energy, realising that life doesn’t have to be dull and it’s what you make it. Afterwards my son said that his friends had really enjoyed talking to us and that made my day. Even my husband admitted he had enjoyed it.
(Just to say my husband is a lovely man but prefers to be at home)
Kate, your piece is skilful and moving and I echo everything Lindsay said about it in the session. It made me think a lot about my relationship with my first born, who arrived in the middle of a tumultuous and grief-filled time in my family. I love your honesty and the things you withhold as much as the things you share. Thank you
This is late and came to me in a stream of consciousness before I had gotten out of bed this morning. But I'm showing up anyway, because as we chatted about on the call last night, showing up in bits and pieces is still showing up.
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Showing up imperfectly has always felt unsafe. What will it mean about me if my messiness shows? Who will I be if I'm not someone who reflects thought, consideration, excellence, polish? What am I governed by if it's not your rules?
I'm a 'good girl' and I have learned my lessons well. To do what I was told, exactly as told. To push beyond my comfort in order to maintain yours. To hammer and press my my needs into the thinnest wafer and hide it, forever, under my tongue.
I did everything right. But then everything went wrong. Mum died. I almost died. David was sick. C was sick. I can't see the shine of my good-girl medals in all that darkness. When every step cracks the eggshells of my broken heart underfoot, how can I do the next right thing?
Why would I do the next right thing?
Being a good girl and doing the right things came with guarantees of safety, of protection, of security - never explicit, only implied, but ever present. If I did what you told me, where is what I'm owed? Loss is everywhere, pain reigns, and I am no better off than those who have followed the paths of their wants.
Now, I have my own mountain to climb. I don't know the way yet. I don't know who will walk alongside me yet. I don't know if I will make it yet.
And yet.
I will go on this path of my choosing. I will fall, I will fail, and I will do the next right thing, for me. My way is not your way; my way is unclear, unknown, uncomfortable. For you. For me, it's light, and beckoning, and bright. I will only go my way, from now on.
Oh the image of the thin wafer of your needs melting under your tongue - so powerful (and I say that as a reformed catholic good girl too), as is the good girl medals failing to shine in that darkness. This is really good, Ingrid, so glad you showed up.
This is so powerful - sometimes those stream of consciousness moments bring so much richness. I loved 'I can't see the shine of my good-girl medals in all that darkness.' Thank you for showing up!
Thanks so much Sasha! Yes I really struggled on Sunday evening and just couldn’t find my words, and then Monday morning they just streamed out. Thank you for reading!
I love the juxtaposition between "reaching for words like he reaches for toys" and "Nana is losing her words, one by one". Beautifully woven piece, Meaghan, going full circle like an O.
If you ask me what Ancient Greek goddess I most identify with, which is a perfectly good question to ask, I will tell you that it’s Hecate. And then I’ll enunciate her name more slowly for you, Heck-a-Tay, to give you time to adjust to my answer not being Athena, which you were, perhaps, expecting.
I share some striking similarities with Hecate. Or, at least, with the earlier versions of Hecate, before she was given her sexy-witch makeover by the lusty, death-obsessed Romans. In her oldest depictions, in mythology and art, Hecate is shown her with torches, a polecat and keys. Okay, so the polecat is a red herring, that ain’t me, but I’m totally a candles and keys kind of a girl, if keys can be all about secrets and ancient doorways. And she is associated with journeys (love) and travel by road, particularly connected to crossroads. The word trivia (literally meaning three ways - the choice you face when you reach a crossroads or ‘common place’, thus ‘trivial’) is linked to Hecate and she was also considered to be a dark, liminal figure with ties to the underworld. This aspect of her persona is represented by two black dogs. So, ‘ish’ to the dark and liminal - love me a bit of liminality and transition - and a double yes to the two black dogs. I mean, what are the chances?!
I have had exactly two black dogs during my lifetime: one I chose and one that chose me.
Not Churchillian black dogs, those black dogs of despair and depression. No, not those - there have been more than two of those.
These two dogs are real dogs. The first one, the one that I chose, was a Doberman. Our neighbours, breeders of Dobermans (I so want that to be ‘Dobermen’), had a new litter around the time of my second birthday, so I got to choose a Doberman puppy. I could say his ‘popper name’ before I could even say ‘proper name’ - it was Rudolf Barlash of Shardways. Very grand. Very handsome. But I called him Snoopy. (I wonder if Hecate did bathos, too…)
Snoopy and I were inseparable. I was an only child and he was my constant companion. And my bolster cushion and my book-reading audience and my hula-hoop competitor and my sous chef for mud-pie making and my attendant when I swam and my guest when I played hotels and my Stanley when I was Livingstone. He was adventure and innocence and lying on the grass and looking at clouds and flannel nighties and Christmas mornings and birthday parties and long walks with my Dad. He was soft as butter and had the most soulful eyes and gentle nature. He was my childhood and I adored him.
We emigrated when I was 11 and we had to leave Snoopy behind. It nearly broke me. When I was told that he’d died, a couple of years later, it signalled the end of my childhood and my hope against homesickness - the moment I realised that I could never go back; that what I’d hung onto as my escape route, through the agony of longing, was only a mirage. Snoopy had represented my life before, but now an ‘after’ life beckoned.
My second black dog, the one that chose me, is a terrier. A Patterdale terrier called Peter. (Peter Patterdale... He had a sister called Pitter.) We went to meet the puppies to choose a girl, but she was otherwise occupied doing a wall of death around the farmhouse kitchen. Nonplussed, I sat on the floor with my back against a unit and the-puppy-who-became-Peter climbed onto my outstretched legs and walked up their length to sit facing me, and then he looked up at me and straight into my soul.
Despite that auspicious initial connection, Pete’s first four or five years were spent mostly with my husband as a working dog. He was very much a family pet off-duty but he was not ‘mine’. Not until I burned out and had enforced time off work with a shoulder injury. Pete assumed the role of carer/protector and hot-water bottle/healer and he became my shadow. Which, it turned out, was a dress-rehearsal for the following year, when my Dad was dying, and the following year, when it was Covid and lockdown, and the following year, when I had treatment for cancer. My ‘Chemo’ Sabe. But, thankfully, not my Grey Friar’s Bobbie - because I got better!
Peter Patterdale shepherded me from near-death back to life and his constancy and commitment to my health and wellbeing was humbling and uplifting in equal measure. It’s like it was fated from that first look we exchanged. Pete was with me through the liminal times, from the before of taking for granted my health and immortality to the after-life of facing my own mortality and focusing on rebuilding my wellness.
Two black dogs who’ve lit up my life and guided me through two sets of significant crossroads - dark transitions which offered a glimpse of the underworld but were followed by a new after-life. The keys to change and growth. I think Hecate would approve, don’t you?
Deborah, I love the stories of you and your black dogs. The paragraph about your childhood friendship with Snoopy is wonderful, and makes me smile as I think of the shenanigans my kids get up to with our dog!
This really resonates with me. My cats were such a comfort after my heart surgery. I love that Peter looked into your soul, animals have a habit of doing that in my experience.
There is an assurance and confidence in your voice Deborah that I am quite envious of. It feels to me like it both draws a reader close while holding them at a distance. I got so much out of this piece. Love all the references and detail. Reading this makes me want to add the same sort of referential depth to my work.
I came here to say almost exactly this. The threads are all an interesting tapestry, and the Hecate jumping off point really grabbed me. And I will be thinking about Snoopy the rest of the day, probably.
I love the shape of this piece Deborah, from Hecate to Snoopy to Peter, and how you link them all together at the end. The paragraph that starts 'Snoopy and I were inseparable' really captures that childhood experience of the world with all those 'ands' - very effective!
When I am apologising for E’s behaviour as he roars yet again at his younger brother, just asking to play Minecraft online with him or to take his turn on the console, I often say, by way of explanation, that he struggles with interruptions and sharing, especially when he is absorbed in gaming.
Please watch out for E, I said to the young summer camp leader before he headed off under her supervision for a couple of days away. Watch out for him – he often gets bullied.
I would like to tell you my voice sounded assured when making this simple request; but it didn’t. I would like to tell you I fearlessly advocate for him and his as-yet-unidentified needs, but I still hope, against all odds and evidence, that he will be fine. I would like to tell you I don’t worry about making a fuss over him for no good reason; but I do; and I feel shame asking for accommodations and “special treatment” for him, especially here in France, with the put-up-or-shut-up approach still prevalent in educational settings, and where his hesitant French renders him dumb and nearly mute.
E does not have the skills to navigate the world with confidence. He struggles in a body that is changing too fast to feel like home, yet that is moving too slow to keep up in a survival-of-the-meanest environment.
If there is one I hardly recognise, my mum said recently looking around at her grandchildren, it’s E.
Stunned, I looked to the left where, for hours already, he had been playing badminton with a few cousins. As my mum wondered aloud where the boy has gone who was always busy, flitting from one activity to the next, always happy and ready to laugh, I watched him stretch his tall frame to reach the shuttlecock and flick it over the net. She was blunt, as is often her way, meant as helpful. I was speechless, as is always my way when I perceive disappointment in her tone. It must be adolescence, she concluded. It will probably pass.
I have noticed already that he might get targeted, the leader said to my concerns about bullying. Don’t worry, I won’t allow it.
This is really powerful writing. I love the phrase “he struggles in a body that is changing too fast to feel like home, yet is moving too slow to keep up in a survival-of -the -meanest environment “ .
I love how you worked in a line from Kate’s piece! It really gives a Chain feeling! I also really feel the self-doubt of parenthood in this - the pressure to *know* what’s best with no doubts and offer certainty to other caretakers. You really captured it here.
Thank you Meaghan. That line, "Dog doesn't have the skills to navigate the world with confidence" really jumped out on first read, and as Lindsay said to just run with the first idea, that's what I did!
This is a really interesting response to the prompt. So good on the web of feelings around your son, your love and protectiveness, and the way intergenerational relationships can be so complicated. Loved 'a body changing too fast to feel like home'
Thank you Emily. Kate's opening provided a great entry point into the difficult emotions around having to apologise for and constantly explain my son's behaviour just so he can be seen and accepted as he is.
Another meal served for 5 when there were only 2 of us at home. When would l learn that all my children had fled the nest. I had long dreamt of this time, my time but it wasn’t easy.It had happened gradually one by one they’d teetered on the the edge of the nest and then taken off. Now my youngest had gone as well and I was bereft. There was a hole in my life. I missed the mothering despite having railed against it for so long, missed how it had filled every waking moment and some of my sleeping moments as well
Just one mature sensible cat
I reasoned with my husband, he wasn’t convinced but slowly with help from my children he acquiesced.
When my daughter and l came back from the cat rescue centre with 2 kittens his patience was stretched almost to breaking point.
They’re brother and sister, we couldn’t separate them.
And so Bruce who resembled a black panther and Meg who was a moody tortoise white became part of the family.Bruce spent most of the first week under the settee too scared to come out, whereas Meg made herself at home sitting on laps, eating her food and often Bruce’s.
I never hear from mum anymore, before she got the cats she was on the phone constantly checking up on me.
As they shredded the furniture they embedded themselves into our lives.Therapy cats, relaxing you after a long day at work. The sound of purring better than any meditation tape and even better than a glass of wine to calm you down.
We had always been a cat family, but the previous cats had been for the children Meg and Bruce were for me.
They soon rose to be at the top of the family hierarchy,children and grandchildren eager to see them, stroke them, feed them.
The house was full again as was my supermarket trolley with cat food and cat litter. My need to mother was satiated,although cats are fiercely independent and see you as their slave( similar to teenagers).
I had been exhausted by motherhood and yet had needed the hole it left filled by another form of mothering. Work alone wasn’t enough, family visits and video calls weren’t enough.Meg and Bruce filled that gap. Now that they’re gone the grief and then the emptiness has started all over again. My husband is getting twitchy, he knows the signs.
Animals bring such joy and comfort and pain when they leave too quickly but I think it’s worth it. I didn’t realise until the end that the cats had died and I felt sad but hope that you have another cat adventure to come.
I loved this Barbara. I often think that I wanted the dog because I had just lost the baby-in-buggy stage. I have forgotten how to simply walk down a street without being tethered to another being whose needs outweigh my own....
As I start writing, my gaze keeps turning towards the top left corner of the living room. There is a gap. It feels like something is missing there. For a moment, I can’t remember and my mind wanders.
Oh right, that is where the reptile box was, the last time I looked after his reptile. But that is not it. That was over 6 months ago. What the hell was supposed to be there?
Ah, yes. The plants.
The two big IKEA plants he didn’t want, so I took them. The ones that make the room look more cosy. The ones I strung with Christmas lights. The ones that are currently waiting for me to collect them from my neighbour’s apartment, the people who leave all their shoes outside their front door. The shoes I cursed as I dragged my heavy suitcase past them up the stairs to my third-floor, no-elevator apartment.
I am trying to fill the void. The one on this page, the one in my life, the one in my living room.
Right now it feels like I have nothing but crap to fill this void. Nothing useful, pretty or meaningful.
Yikes, I really am a glass-half-empty kind of person.
The truth is, I’ve just spent a week learning and growing. How to lead. How connect. I walked a tightrope six meters high in the trees of Catalunya.
I was in my essence. And my “I am” essence is Danger.
When I speak from this place, the wind stirs. The leaves in the trees rustle.
When I am in my essence, I do not beat around the bush. I point straight to the elephant in the room. But right now there is no elephant. Not even a reptile.
How’s that for a cacophony of metaphors?
The only animals I see from my window are red metal giraffes, that is, the cranes that load the cargo ships at the docks just down the street. I watch their reflection in the large windows of the luxury apartment across from me.
Although, actually, that is not true. I just caught myself slipping into ‘woe is me’ mode again. I do see birds from my windows. Seagulls. Redstarts. Pigeons. House sparrows. And another bird whose name I can’t remember.
I suck at bird watching. But boy, I love the birds.
Oh man Liza, I love this. The mixed metaphors call out and the space you’ve created for some wallowing (a necessary step i know I struggle with) and I just love the last line as a button that holds it all!
Absolutely loved this - especially the second half - it feels like you get into your writing stride at this line - I was in my essence. And my “I am” essence is Danger.
I also love 'red metal giraffes' - feels so fresh and linguistically new to me!
The way you've braided all those animals and plants and metaphors into this piece is really effective Liza, really drew me in. Now pondering what my essence might be and how I might write about that...
Thank you, Ellen. I wondered if it was a messy way of introducing the animals and plants but I love the idea that they are braided into the piece. My essence/my "I AM" type comes from the 10-month leadership programme that I am currently attending- they define seven I AM types and the essence is based on the impact we have on other people in the room. It is fascinating and it really helps me be more aligned in my actions and the way I show up in relationships.
Oliver loves his O. He won’t go anywhere without it. Not even Sunday Drag Brunch on Main Street with the Countess Mascara.
He chews the O. He bangs the O. He throws the O.
Because O is for Oliver. Literally. It’s part of his favorite puzzle, one that features his name. He actually has two of these puzzles and loves them both. I never knew babies actually loved puzzles. I always thought they were decorative. But he loves these. Loves pulling them apart. And he loves his O.
One O is superior to the other. I, personally, like the sage green, oval-shaped O with a little knob. Everything on that puzzle is knobbed, which seems inviting as puzzles go. Already though, he makes it clear we are different people, because Oliver loves the other one. The big, round, white O. Equally good for chewing on or putting his hand through. Satisfying to wrap his baby monkey toes around, judging by the smug little smile that lights up his face whenever he does this. It’s usually followed by yeeting the O across the room, and screaming for me to return it to him before the dog gets it.
O, of course, is for Oliver. Not for the dog.
This treasured puzzle was a gift from his only living great-grandparent, my Nana.
Except she didn’t really get it for him. Nana was already dying when Oliver was born. In fact, we both announced to our family on Mother’s Day last year. I was pregnant. She had double breast cancer.
So even if she’d had the faculties to shop when he was born, which she didn’t, I don’t think her mind would have been on toys for my newborn. At least, I hope it wouldn’t have been.
I mostly find myself hoping she has as few lucid moments as possible. I hope she makes as few memories as humanly possible of the plush hospice room I know is costing my aunts, uncles and parents chunks of their inheritance. I hope instead she’s lost in pleasant memories and that when she wakes in the night that she looks around and sees her room and slides back into sleep without worrying. That the confusion is doing its job of providing a soft buffer for the hardest transition life has to offer. The last one.
Oliver is just starting to learn that names go with faces. Looking in the mirror with him, I’ll say “Who is that baby?! Who is this OLIVER?” And he’ll wave his O around, narrowly missing my eyeball and shriek with the unfiltered joy of someone with everything left to discover.
He responds pretty reliably to his name already; he’s not even a year old and I can already tell when he’s ignoring me for something more interesting. Right now that’s usually plastic balls in a tissue box I’ve spared from the recycling like a clever Instagram mommy. He’s learning words for other faces too. Dada mostly, because it comes easily to babies. Mama will come. Still, even without the word, he lights up when he sees us. Tries to say something, anything to show he sees us. Reaching for words like he reaches for toys at the edge of his grasp.
Nana is losing her words, one by one. My name went early. I didn’t see her enough before this, let alone since she moved into hospice. I might be Courtney or Susie, but most often I am no one. She doesn’t call me anything. She doesn’t even want to reach for the name that’s too far away. She doesn’t know it, but she knows she doesn’t know it. So when I visit, I am just one more concerned face she can’t quite place.
We visit pleasantly, when I can make it. Related strangers who don’t know enough about one another to talk about much beyond idle chit chat. Not that she’s up to much chit chat. So I bring Oliver so I don’t have to think of things to say that she won’t hear. I hold my tiny, charismatic giant, and he holds his O. It’s convenient that he holds it, too, because every time she asks his name, we can point to the puzzle piece.
O is for Oliver. “You got him that puzzle, Nana. He loves it so much.”
We don’t know when the funeral will be, but we know it will be soon. Days, according to my aunt. The one who actually bought the puzzle. My parents haven’t said anything yet. Is my dad in denial or pain? Probably both. But my aunt let me know, just in case we wanted to make plans.
Thanks, I texted back not knowing in the least how I could possibly make plans for this new stage of pre-grief I found myself in.
“We’ll do whatever you want,” Nick reassures me, taking Oliver and his O downstairs.
Except I don’t know what I want. It’s hard enough to hear myself on normal days. It’s taken years of therapy and living just to feel confident putting off grocery shopping to do something silly just because. Now, when everyone’s feelings are screaming louder than Oliver without his O, how can anyone expect me to know what I want?
I’ll probably go home first. Take Oliver with me to see Nana one last time. If we get there in time. Stay with my parents. They’ll want to see Oliver and it will make my dad feel better to have us around. Having Oliver around makes everyone feel better.
At the top of my packing list, I write O for Oliver.
This is beautiful Meaghan. My mum has told me that my nana lost her words as I learned mine, she stopped feeding herself as I started. Your narrative shows that contrast between the different life stages, and you, there in the middle.
I had to stop throughout this piece to take a breath at your beautiful writing. So many lines struck me; the line about pleasant memories, the line about unfiltered joy with everything left to discover, the line about Oliver reaching for words and toys… I could keep going. Such a skilful juxtaposing of new life and ending life. Amazing piece Meaghan!
There are so many things to say about this. I especially liked the circularity of the 'O' motif / the circle of life, the tension between losing of / gaining of language and knowledge. I thought this was remarkable. Loved your submission again this week.
Thank you! The losing and learning words was what came to me super clearly after reading Kate’s piece. I’m super pleased it’s landing well with people.
Beautifully woven piece Meaghan, there's so many layers to the juxtaposition between a new baby and a dying elder. I particularly liked the repeated motif around language - developing it, losing it or struggling to articulate your needs and wants.
Thank you! Their language stuff connected so clearly to me, but my articulation being connected to that felt like something I could only see by writing it out!
This is really, really good Meaghan. There are too many lines for me to pick out, but the thread of O, the juxtaposition of his learning words and Nana losing hers - and having been in that place of pre-grief, of hospice rooms, of strange limbo; now in a place where we have a date, I just felt this so deeply. Thank you for sharing.
Breast is best, didn’t you know? Don’t try to pretend you didn’t say the very same thing to a hundred mothers in the cramped postnatal ward. You with your stethoscope and name badge. You, the midwife.
That was before, of course.
You spoke about the antibodies, the protein, the way - how clever! - the milk tailors itself to a baby’s individual needs. You made it sound simple, all that talk of positioning and attachment, of nose to nipple and a wide-open mouth. You made them think they could fill the marble of their baby’s stomach with ease. Almost certainly, you spouted the line about breastfeeding being free. In fact, didn’t you roll your eyes sometimes when 4AM rolled around on a night shift and a shellshocked mother told you her baby just. wouldn't. latch.
Hypocrite.
Breastfeeding shouldn’t be painful, you used to say. A few strong sucks and the baby will settle into a rhythm.
And then you realised the rhythm was one of razor-sharp dread with a shard of glass chaser. Before you peeled off the breast pad saw your own nipples, cracked and bloody. Before you felt as though you were losing your mind.
Remember how you felt like a fugitive in the supermarket aisles? Certain that each person you passed knew how terrible a mother you were. You could hear their whispers as you laid those tiny green bottles in the trolley behind your sleeping baby. Poor kid, they said. Poisoned. Neglected. Better line up a therapist now.
You were a mother who could offer no sustenance, although you pretended for a while, didn’t you? Sterilising bottles in secret and drip-feeding synthetic nutrition into your baby’s body during the hours you spent alone. Keeping up the illusion you were good when anyone else was around. Hiding your winces. Letting the baby suckle.
There will come a point, you say now in your classes, when you can no longer hide. You will hit a wall.
You can still feel the impact. A miserable day, in every sense. Sheets of rain pouring from a black sky as you lay face down on the bed. What do you want to do? he asked a little impatiently, rocking the baby.
The answer, as always, was walk.
You wrapped up against the weather, the baby tucked snugly under the plastic rain cover, and trod the muddy canal side path until you were drained. Your wrongness exposed.
And in the deluge, he held you. Told you he was sorry.
You asked why, confused by his tenderness in the face of your transgressions. For believing it was free, he said. For believing it was easy.
There is a cost, you tell eager parents-to-be now. And if the cost is your tether to the world, to your sanity, that is too high a price to pay. The baby will not need therapy because you choose to feed them formula. There will be a hundred other things you do that lead them to the therapist’s door, yes, but – I promise – retiring your nipples will not be one of them.
This is so powerful and l feel your anger. My daughter had the same feelings , it was so hard to find the right words to make her feel ok about herself.
This is so powerful, so angry and moving, so precise. So good on that dead weight of simplistic societal expectations. I loved the unexpected resolution of the rainy walk and the conversation with your partner
"razor sharp dread with a shard of glass chaser": Oof this is so powerful, Emily! And his holding you and saying I'm sorry for *your* transgressions - so beautiful.
After a 5 hour journey which included a taxi, a train and two buses, arriving home should have been a sigh of relief. But bringing a boy home was never going to be easy, it was always going to feel like holding one's breath for an entire weekend.
My parents were very relaxed about the whole thing, even offering that he and I could share the same bedroom despite only just being over the age of consent. It was a clever move on their part because it meant we spent the entire night not moving in the bed for fear that they would hear a creak and feel the need to smile knowingly over breakfast the next morning!
In fact the problem was that they were perhaps a little too relaxed. We were collected from the bus by my father. Climbing into the 15 year old Skoda which sported two different door colours, he spent the 15 minute drive to our house updating us on the progress he was making with clearing a blockage in the septic tank. Apparently my menopausal mother had taken to using baby wipes to deal with her elevated levels of sweating and unwittingly had been flushing them down the toilet.
This, of course, was not exactly the first impression I had been hoping to make, but I assured myself that seeing as the boy hadn’t jumped out of the moving car yet, things could only get better from there on in.
There is no better way to see the flaws in ones home than when you have visitors arriving, and our home sure had flaws! We were in the process of renovating a very old, very dilapidated schoolhouse, and upon opening the front door we were greeted with a vast space of…nothingness. There was no flooring. ‘You’ll need to walk along the floor joists’, my father casually said, as if he was simply talking about keeping off the grass in the local park.
Having navigated our way across the breadth of the house and reaching the relative safety of the stairs we were greeted by our old cocker spaniel, wearing one of my fathers old yellowed vests, held around his waist with one of my mothers multicoloured scarves. My mother followed quickly after and explained that he had cut his belly climbing through a barbed wire fence and the stitches needed to be kept covered. Seemingly the poor dog had left his dignity as well as his fur in the fence that day.
So had my mother as it happens, as she descended the stairs wearing a white floral nightdress with curlers in her hair.
At this point I could no longer bear to look at the boys face, fearing I would see my own horror reflected in his eyes.
The weekend went about as well as one would expect after that, although to be fair to the boy, he did take it all very much in his casual stride. On the train back to boarding school late on Sunday evening, he looked at me with an amused smile and said, ‘it really is no small wonder, that you are the way you are!’. ‘Yes’, I agreed, ‘it’s a huge wonder that I turned out half as good as I did!’.
We carry it like a rough gem in the heart, slowly polished by blood and tears.
I've returned home from a funeral — one so heart-felt and exquisite, so open to grief and so thankful for the life of the loved one that it was both a blessing to be there, and made the loss more profound.
We're all of us not much more than a small hand print on the skin of time, but in that time we have the chance to love, to leave an impression in the clay of those we touch.
***
I once loved a girl who told me I was not who I seemed but a Moorish princess from 10th century Toledo and she was the Muslim prince who returned to his ancestral Jewish faith when he knew his love would be unrequited.
It started like this —
We are arrayed in rows, desks joined in pairs, twenty-eight eleven-year-old girls in stiff navy-blue pinafores. The girl I share a desk with in this alphabetical arrangement is called Susan and has spread her pencils across the desk. I nudge them back towards her side. At the front of the class another girl, not much taller than me, chats with the teacher as though they are old friends. Fine strawberry-blonde hair, an easy laugh. Mrs G. tells her to choose someone to assist her as the class book-monitor.
She points to me.
I chose you for your plaits, she tells me on the way to the stationary office. If you get out of hand I can pull on them.
I scowl.
She laughs. But really I recognised you — always so small and pale. We’ve been so many people, some famous, some no-one’s heard of. We were most ourselves as Ben Haddaj and Casilda. I always recognise you.
She smiles at my puzzlement. You’ll soon understand.
Over lunch, she asks what my favourite flower is.
Rose, I say. Oh and hawthorn. I love daisies too. They…
Tell me about roses.
I love everything about them. The dog roses in Kirkleatham. I like the way they look so fragile but have big red thorns. And the faeries use the hips to make themselves invisible.
Faeries?
I nod, return to the roses — And the cultivated ones. My dad grows them — they have beautiful names. They’re delicate and fussy about their soil, you have to protect them from greenfly. They’re a lot of work, but special…
Antoine de St. Exupéry, she interupts.
Who?
He wrote The Little Prince. I can see you’ll need a reading list.
It’s the time you have wasted for your rose that makes your rose so important … You become responsible forever for what you’ve tamed.
She grins. Perhaps you’ll tame me.
We role played our way through seven years of schooling...
***
Until I fell in love with a boy who had no romantic notions about who I might be, who set about defining me, who told me my story was so much more mundane...
Those were terrible years. Those were wonderful years. So much grief. The joy of four births, home educating children, walking their paths with them...
Until... after 31 years... he could not tame me. And life began again — alone, not lonely. Until…
***
It started like this:
I'm teaching at a writing residency and one afternoon we take the group up into the hills, above the valley that runs down to Conwy.
A., one of the group on the course, arrives at the broken wall at the same moment as me. Decades ago, when the place was inhabited, there had been a day when the mobile cinema arrived further down the valley. The houses emptied for this annual treat. No-one was home when the dam broke through the wall, flooding every building. Not one life lost.
A. says something about ‘the writing on the wall’ which had not worked out so well for the Chaldean king, Belshazzar. I reply with a misquote of Daniel’s message to the king: weighed, measured, found wanting. And as A. laughs, the slightest glance passes between us…
Then he walks away, down to the lake.
***
I began mentoring his writing.
We began emailing daily, meeting occasionally till I wrote:
A relationship is like a shark. If it doesn’t keep moving forward it will die.
I think we’ve got a live shark on our hands. Hoping you might think so too, but it’s not a threat…
We married in September 2016, two years and five months after the shark email.
***
In 2014 the Marlinsky Opera staged the whole of Wagner’s Ring Cycle in Birmingham. It had only been staged in the UK twice before. The girl I had loved had taught me to love this music and I went with my oldest daughter — four long evenings of extraordinary drama and music.
On the second night I noticed a woman who looked like the woman the girl I’d loved might have become, approached her to ask if she was indeed… She wasn’t. I found it hard to imagine she would not be there, but listening to the music, we were together, somewhere we always are…
I loved reading this Jan; the mysterious love friendship as a child, the cultivation, and what she taught you cleverly interspersed with life, taming, and the shark email.
Kate, thank you for sharing this piece, both in the first draft version and this one. It was moving and made me emotional in more than one way. I loved the added bits. I am sorry for this huge loss and thank you for creating these words from it. I was intrigued the beginning what could be behind Dog's behaviour and behind how much you tell others about it. I would not have guessed.
For some time now I’ve been feeling restless and a bit dissatisfied, kind of stuck in a rut of retirement that I have made too comfortable for myself. At first I just loved the freedom of not having the long travel to and from work and my days mapped out for me. Having the freedom to pursue my hobbies of writing and art. But recently I have felt an internal tapping inside of me and I am trying to figure out what it is trying to say.
Then something happened at the weekend that made me feel young and alive once again. My son and his friends had organised a music festival not too far from where we live and asked if we could pick up some of his friends from the train station and take them there, pop in and say hello. So we did and with a tiny car stuffed full of large backpacks we set out to find the festival. Following bright coloured bunting we drove down an unmade track, the undercarriage of the car sounding in great pain, as though it was about to collapse, along with my swearing husband who was driving and not very happy about it! Bumping along we passed black and white dappled cows, who watched us with their large sleepy eyes in a very uninterested way whilst chewing the cud. Eventually we came to a clearing which opened up into a wall of bright ribbons blowing in the breeze. Music was playing and young people milled around chatting whilst holding drinks, whilst others were helping each other set up their tents. I stood taking it all in and felt as though I had arrived on the set of ‘A Midsummer Night’s Dream’, expecting a Shakespearean character to appear at any moment. My son greeted us with hugs and introduced us to his friend. My husband quickly suggested we go home. It is an old family joke that whenever we arrive anywhere, we say, “Shall we go now?” I was offered a glass of wine, “You can have one when you get home”, he said. I ignored him and accepted it and started chatting and after a while my husband joined in. I had such a lovely time, hearing about their lives and was surprised how interested they were in us ‘oldies’. Sorry, but I find so many older people are only interested in talking about themselves. Maybe I am one, I hope not.
Finally, after being immune to my husband’s nudging, I agreed to go home. I left the wood on a high with renewed energy, realising that life doesn’t have to be dull and it’s what you make it. Afterwards my son said that his friends had really enjoyed talking to us and that made my day. Even my husband admitted he had enjoyed it.
(Just to say my husband is a lovely man but prefers to be at home)
This reads like an alarm clock, especially at the end. Super cool!
This really hit home for me: “I can't see the shine of my good-girl medals in all that darkness.”
Thanks for showing up and sharing it with us.
Kate, your piece is skilful and moving and I echo everything Lindsay said about it in the session. It made me think a lot about my relationship with my first born, who arrived in the middle of a tumultuous and grief-filled time in my family. I love your honesty and the things you withhold as much as the things you share. Thank you
As a life long rule follower and believer that everything would be alright if I just did ‘the right thing’, this piece really spoke to me Ingrid.
- I can't see the shine of my good-girl medals in all that darkness - is an excellent line.
Inspired to try some stream of consciousness next time - I find it quite scary but I can see that magic is possible with this approach!
This is late and came to me in a stream of consciousness before I had gotten out of bed this morning. But I'm showing up anyway, because as we chatted about on the call last night, showing up in bits and pieces is still showing up.
-
Showing up imperfectly has always felt unsafe. What will it mean about me if my messiness shows? Who will I be if I'm not someone who reflects thought, consideration, excellence, polish? What am I governed by if it's not your rules?
I'm a 'good girl' and I have learned my lessons well. To do what I was told, exactly as told. To push beyond my comfort in order to maintain yours. To hammer and press my my needs into the thinnest wafer and hide it, forever, under my tongue.
I did everything right. But then everything went wrong. Mum died. I almost died. David was sick. C was sick. I can't see the shine of my good-girl medals in all that darkness. When every step cracks the eggshells of my broken heart underfoot, how can I do the next right thing?
Why would I do the next right thing?
Being a good girl and doing the right things came with guarantees of safety, of protection, of security - never explicit, only implied, but ever present. If I did what you told me, where is what I'm owed? Loss is everywhere, pain reigns, and I am no better off than those who have followed the paths of their wants.
Now, I have my own mountain to climb. I don't know the way yet. I don't know who will walk alongside me yet. I don't know if I will make it yet.
And yet.
I will go on this path of my choosing. I will fall, I will fail, and I will do the next right thing, for me. My way is not your way; my way is unclear, unknown, uncomfortable. For you. For me, it's light, and beckoning, and bright. I will only go my way, from now on.
Oh the image of the thin wafer of your needs melting under your tongue - so powerful (and I say that as a reformed catholic good girl too), as is the good girl medals failing to shine in that darkness. This is really good, Ingrid, so glad you showed up.
As a fellow good girl so much of this resonates. Great writing.
Ah good girls unite! Thanks for reading Barbara!
Oh I really do love those moments when the words just come to you in a flash and flood! Bright and beckoning. Really beautiful writing, Ingrid 💛
These moments have felt few and far between lately, but grateful when they come! Thanks so much for reading Sarah!
This is so powerful - sometimes those stream of consciousness moments bring so much richness. I loved 'I can't see the shine of my good-girl medals in all that darkness.' Thank you for showing up!
Thanks so much Sasha! Yes I really struggled on Sunday evening and just couldn’t find my words, and then Monday morning they just streamed out. Thank you for reading!
Wow, Ingrid. This sentence: "When every step cracks the eggshells of my broken heart underfoot, how can I do the next right thing?"
Thanks so much Liza! I wrote it and then wasn’t really sure where it came from! Thank you for reading x
I love the juxtaposition between "reaching for words like he reaches for toys" and "Nana is losing her words, one by one". Beautifully woven piece, Meaghan, going full circle like an O.
Black Dogs
If you ask me what Ancient Greek goddess I most identify with, which is a perfectly good question to ask, I will tell you that it’s Hecate. And then I’ll enunciate her name more slowly for you, Heck-a-Tay, to give you time to adjust to my answer not being Athena, which you were, perhaps, expecting.
I share some striking similarities with Hecate. Or, at least, with the earlier versions of Hecate, before she was given her sexy-witch makeover by the lusty, death-obsessed Romans. In her oldest depictions, in mythology and art, Hecate is shown her with torches, a polecat and keys. Okay, so the polecat is a red herring, that ain’t me, but I’m totally a candles and keys kind of a girl, if keys can be all about secrets and ancient doorways. And she is associated with journeys (love) and travel by road, particularly connected to crossroads. The word trivia (literally meaning three ways - the choice you face when you reach a crossroads or ‘common place’, thus ‘trivial’) is linked to Hecate and she was also considered to be a dark, liminal figure with ties to the underworld. This aspect of her persona is represented by two black dogs. So, ‘ish’ to the dark and liminal - love me a bit of liminality and transition - and a double yes to the two black dogs. I mean, what are the chances?!
I have had exactly two black dogs during my lifetime: one I chose and one that chose me.
Not Churchillian black dogs, those black dogs of despair and depression. No, not those - there have been more than two of those.
These two dogs are real dogs. The first one, the one that I chose, was a Doberman. Our neighbours, breeders of Dobermans (I so want that to be ‘Dobermen’), had a new litter around the time of my second birthday, so I got to choose a Doberman puppy. I could say his ‘popper name’ before I could even say ‘proper name’ - it was Rudolf Barlash of Shardways. Very grand. Very handsome. But I called him Snoopy. (I wonder if Hecate did bathos, too…)
Snoopy and I were inseparable. I was an only child and he was my constant companion. And my bolster cushion and my book-reading audience and my hula-hoop competitor and my sous chef for mud-pie making and my attendant when I swam and my guest when I played hotels and my Stanley when I was Livingstone. He was adventure and innocence and lying on the grass and looking at clouds and flannel nighties and Christmas mornings and birthday parties and long walks with my Dad. He was soft as butter and had the most soulful eyes and gentle nature. He was my childhood and I adored him.
We emigrated when I was 11 and we had to leave Snoopy behind. It nearly broke me. When I was told that he’d died, a couple of years later, it signalled the end of my childhood and my hope against homesickness - the moment I realised that I could never go back; that what I’d hung onto as my escape route, through the agony of longing, was only a mirage. Snoopy had represented my life before, but now an ‘after’ life beckoned.
My second black dog, the one that chose me, is a terrier. A Patterdale terrier called Peter. (Peter Patterdale... He had a sister called Pitter.) We went to meet the puppies to choose a girl, but she was otherwise occupied doing a wall of death around the farmhouse kitchen. Nonplussed, I sat on the floor with my back against a unit and the-puppy-who-became-Peter climbed onto my outstretched legs and walked up their length to sit facing me, and then he looked up at me and straight into my soul.
Despite that auspicious initial connection, Pete’s first four or five years were spent mostly with my husband as a working dog. He was very much a family pet off-duty but he was not ‘mine’. Not until I burned out and had enforced time off work with a shoulder injury. Pete assumed the role of carer/protector and hot-water bottle/healer and he became my shadow. Which, it turned out, was a dress-rehearsal for the following year, when my Dad was dying, and the following year, when it was Covid and lockdown, and the following year, when I had treatment for cancer. My ‘Chemo’ Sabe. But, thankfully, not my Grey Friar’s Bobbie - because I got better!
Peter Patterdale shepherded me from near-death back to life and his constancy and commitment to my health and wellbeing was humbling and uplifting in equal measure. It’s like it was fated from that first look we exchanged. Pete was with me through the liminal times, from the before of taking for granted my health and immortality to the after-life of facing my own mortality and focusing on rebuilding my wellness.
Two black dogs who’ve lit up my life and guided me through two sets of significant crossroads - dark transitions which offered a glimpse of the underworld but were followed by a new after-life. The keys to change and growth. I think Hecate would approve, don’t you?
Still no polecat, but that’s fine by me.
I really enjoyed reading this Deborah. Loved the Hecate associations and the clever transition to your life and two black dog stories.
Deborah, I love the stories of you and your black dogs. The paragraph about your childhood friendship with Snoopy is wonderful, and makes me smile as I think of the shenanigans my kids get up to with our dog!
This really resonates with me. My cats were such a comfort after my heart surgery. I love that Peter looked into your soul, animals have a habit of doing that in my experience.
This piece really pulled me in with the storytelling. And your use of language is just so skilled. Beautiful. Thank you!
There is an assurance and confidence in your voice Deborah that I am quite envious of. It feels to me like it both draws a reader close while holding them at a distance. I got so much out of this piece. Love all the references and detail. Reading this makes me want to add the same sort of referential depth to my work.
Loved finding out about Hecate and crossroads and your two black dogs, Deborah. My heart broke a little reading you had to leave Snoopy behind.
I came here to say almost exactly this. The threads are all an interesting tapestry, and the Hecate jumping off point really grabbed me. And I will be thinking about Snoopy the rest of the day, probably.
I love the shape of this piece Deborah, from Hecate to Snoopy to Peter, and how you link them all together at the end. The paragraph that starts 'Snoopy and I were inseparable' really captures that childhood experience of the world with all those 'ands' - very effective!
When I am apologising for E’s behaviour as he roars yet again at his younger brother, just asking to play Minecraft online with him or to take his turn on the console, I often say, by way of explanation, that he struggles with interruptions and sharing, especially when he is absorbed in gaming.
Please watch out for E, I said to the young summer camp leader before he headed off under her supervision for a couple of days away. Watch out for him – he often gets bullied.
I would like to tell you my voice sounded assured when making this simple request; but it didn’t. I would like to tell you I fearlessly advocate for him and his as-yet-unidentified needs, but I still hope, against all odds and evidence, that he will be fine. I would like to tell you I don’t worry about making a fuss over him for no good reason; but I do; and I feel shame asking for accommodations and “special treatment” for him, especially here in France, with the put-up-or-shut-up approach still prevalent in educational settings, and where his hesitant French renders him dumb and nearly mute.
E does not have the skills to navigate the world with confidence. He struggles in a body that is changing too fast to feel like home, yet that is moving too slow to keep up in a survival-of-the-meanest environment.
If there is one I hardly recognise, my mum said recently looking around at her grandchildren, it’s E.
Stunned, I looked to the left where, for hours already, he had been playing badminton with a few cousins. As my mum wondered aloud where the boy has gone who was always busy, flitting from one activity to the next, always happy and ready to laugh, I watched him stretch his tall frame to reach the shuttlecock and flick it over the net. She was blunt, as is often her way, meant as helpful. I was speechless, as is always my way when I perceive disappointment in her tone. It must be adolescence, she concluded. It will probably pass.
I have noticed already that he might get targeted, the leader said to my concerns about bullying. Don’t worry, I won’t allow it.
Brilliant response to the prompt! And wow do I feel those doubts and fears as a parent 💛
Thank you Sarah, we are in the process of having his needs assessed and it's been both eye-opening and confusing and confronting.
This is really powerful writing. I love the phrase “he struggles in a body that is changing too fast to feel like home, yet is moving too slow to keep up in a survival-of -the -meanest environment “ .
Thank you Barbara.
Annette thank you for sharing this. I could see the echos immediately - as Meaghan says it feels very in keeping with the spirit of this endeavour.
Your final paragraphs are understated and so powerful.
Kate, I am delighted that you like what I've done with your opening. Thank you.
I love how you worked in a line from Kate’s piece! It really gives a Chain feeling! I also really feel the self-doubt of parenthood in this - the pressure to *know* what’s best with no doubts and offer certainty to other caretakers. You really captured it here.
Thank you Meaghan. That line, "Dog doesn't have the skills to navigate the world with confidence" really jumped out on first read, and as Lindsay said to just run with the first idea, that's what I did!
This is a really interesting response to the prompt. So good on the web of feelings around your son, your love and protectiveness, and the way intergenerational relationships can be so complicated. Loved 'a body changing too fast to feel like home'
Thank you Sasha. Kate's líne about Dog not having the skills to navigate the world with confidence called to me from the get go, so I ran with it.
Annette, this is so powerful and speaks to the thoughts I think so many of us hide or try to make more palatable. Thank you for sharing <3
Thank you Emily. Kate's opening provided a great entry point into the difficult emotions around having to apologise for and constantly explain my son's behaviour just so he can be seen and accepted as he is.
Another meal served for 5 when there were only 2 of us at home. When would l learn that all my children had fled the nest. I had long dreamt of this time, my time but it wasn’t easy.It had happened gradually one by one they’d teetered on the the edge of the nest and then taken off. Now my youngest had gone as well and I was bereft. There was a hole in my life. I missed the mothering despite having railed against it for so long, missed how it had filled every waking moment and some of my sleeping moments as well
Just one mature sensible cat
I reasoned with my husband, he wasn’t convinced but slowly with help from my children he acquiesced.
When my daughter and l came back from the cat rescue centre with 2 kittens his patience was stretched almost to breaking point.
They’re brother and sister, we couldn’t separate them.
And so Bruce who resembled a black panther and Meg who was a moody tortoise white became part of the family.Bruce spent most of the first week under the settee too scared to come out, whereas Meg made herself at home sitting on laps, eating her food and often Bruce’s.
I never hear from mum anymore, before she got the cats she was on the phone constantly checking up on me.
As they shredded the furniture they embedded themselves into our lives.Therapy cats, relaxing you after a long day at work. The sound of purring better than any meditation tape and even better than a glass of wine to calm you down.
We had always been a cat family, but the previous cats had been for the children Meg and Bruce were for me.
They soon rose to be at the top of the family hierarchy,children and grandchildren eager to see them, stroke them, feed them.
The house was full again as was my supermarket trolley with cat food and cat litter. My need to mother was satiated,although cats are fiercely independent and see you as their slave( similar to teenagers).
I had been exhausted by motherhood and yet had needed the hole it left filled by another form of mothering. Work alone wasn’t enough, family visits and video calls weren’t enough.Meg and Bruce filled that gap. Now that they’re gone the grief and then the emptiness has started all over again. My husband is getting twitchy, he knows the signs.
Animals bring such joy and comfort and pain when they leave too quickly but I think it’s worth it. I didn’t realise until the end that the cats had died and I felt sad but hope that you have another cat adventure to come.
I loved this Barbara. I often think that I wanted the dog because I had just lost the baby-in-buggy stage. I have forgotten how to simply walk down a street without being tethered to another being whose needs outweigh my own....
Love the closing line, Barbara!
Love how you've examined the push and pull of mothering in this piece Barbara.
I love the tension between needing mothering and railing against it!
As I start writing, my gaze keeps turning towards the top left corner of the living room. There is a gap. It feels like something is missing there. For a moment, I can’t remember and my mind wanders.
Oh right, that is where the reptile box was, the last time I looked after his reptile. But that is not it. That was over 6 months ago. What the hell was supposed to be there?
Ah, yes. The plants.
The two big IKEA plants he didn’t want, so I took them. The ones that make the room look more cosy. The ones I strung with Christmas lights. The ones that are currently waiting for me to collect them from my neighbour’s apartment, the people who leave all their shoes outside their front door. The shoes I cursed as I dragged my heavy suitcase past them up the stairs to my third-floor, no-elevator apartment.
I am trying to fill the void. The one on this page, the one in my life, the one in my living room.
Right now it feels like I have nothing but crap to fill this void. Nothing useful, pretty or meaningful.
Yikes, I really am a glass-half-empty kind of person.
The truth is, I’ve just spent a week learning and growing. How to lead. How connect. I walked a tightrope six meters high in the trees of Catalunya.
I was in my essence. And my “I am” essence is Danger.
When I speak from this place, the wind stirs. The leaves in the trees rustle.
When I am in my essence, I do not beat around the bush. I point straight to the elephant in the room. But right now there is no elephant. Not even a reptile.
How’s that for a cacophony of metaphors?
The only animals I see from my window are red metal giraffes, that is, the cranes that load the cargo ships at the docks just down the street. I watch their reflection in the large windows of the luxury apartment across from me.
Although, actually, that is not true. I just caught myself slipping into ‘woe is me’ mode again. I do see birds from my windows. Seagulls. Redstarts. Pigeons. House sparrows. And another bird whose name I can’t remember.
I suck at bird watching. But boy, I love the birds.
Oh man Liza, I love this. The mixed metaphors call out and the space you’ve created for some wallowing (a necessary step i know I struggle with) and I just love the last line as a button that holds it all!
Thank you, Meghan!
Absolutely loved this - especially the second half - it feels like you get into your writing stride at this line - I was in my essence. And my “I am” essence is Danger.
I also love 'red metal giraffes' - feels so fresh and linguistically new to me!
Thank you, Kate!
The way you've braided all those animals and plants and metaphors into this piece is really effective Liza, really drew me in. Now pondering what my essence might be and how I might write about that...
Thank you, Ellen. I wondered if it was a messy way of introducing the animals and plants but I love the idea that they are braided into the piece. My essence/my "I AM" type comes from the 10-month leadership programme that I am currently attending- they define seven I AM types and the essence is based on the impact we have on other people in the room. It is fascinating and it really helps me be more aligned in my actions and the way I show up in relationships.
Loved following the trail of this -- so immersive
Thank you, Jan.
O is for Oliver.
Oliver loves his O. He won’t go anywhere without it. Not even Sunday Drag Brunch on Main Street with the Countess Mascara.
He chews the O. He bangs the O. He throws the O.
Because O is for Oliver. Literally. It’s part of his favorite puzzle, one that features his name. He actually has two of these puzzles and loves them both. I never knew babies actually loved puzzles. I always thought they were decorative. But he loves these. Loves pulling them apart. And he loves his O.
One O is superior to the other. I, personally, like the sage green, oval-shaped O with a little knob. Everything on that puzzle is knobbed, which seems inviting as puzzles go. Already though, he makes it clear we are different people, because Oliver loves the other one. The big, round, white O. Equally good for chewing on or putting his hand through. Satisfying to wrap his baby monkey toes around, judging by the smug little smile that lights up his face whenever he does this. It’s usually followed by yeeting the O across the room, and screaming for me to return it to him before the dog gets it.
O, of course, is for Oliver. Not for the dog.
This treasured puzzle was a gift from his only living great-grandparent, my Nana.
Except she didn’t really get it for him. Nana was already dying when Oliver was born. In fact, we both announced to our family on Mother’s Day last year. I was pregnant. She had double breast cancer.
So even if she’d had the faculties to shop when he was born, which she didn’t, I don’t think her mind would have been on toys for my newborn. At least, I hope it wouldn’t have been.
I mostly find myself hoping she has as few lucid moments as possible. I hope she makes as few memories as humanly possible of the plush hospice room I know is costing my aunts, uncles and parents chunks of their inheritance. I hope instead she’s lost in pleasant memories and that when she wakes in the night that she looks around and sees her room and slides back into sleep without worrying. That the confusion is doing its job of providing a soft buffer for the hardest transition life has to offer. The last one.
Oliver is just starting to learn that names go with faces. Looking in the mirror with him, I’ll say “Who is that baby?! Who is this OLIVER?” And he’ll wave his O around, narrowly missing my eyeball and shriek with the unfiltered joy of someone with everything left to discover.
He responds pretty reliably to his name already; he’s not even a year old and I can already tell when he’s ignoring me for something more interesting. Right now that’s usually plastic balls in a tissue box I’ve spared from the recycling like a clever Instagram mommy. He’s learning words for other faces too. Dada mostly, because it comes easily to babies. Mama will come. Still, even without the word, he lights up when he sees us. Tries to say something, anything to show he sees us. Reaching for words like he reaches for toys at the edge of his grasp.
Nana is losing her words, one by one. My name went early. I didn’t see her enough before this, let alone since she moved into hospice. I might be Courtney or Susie, but most often I am no one. She doesn’t call me anything. She doesn’t even want to reach for the name that’s too far away. She doesn’t know it, but she knows she doesn’t know it. So when I visit, I am just one more concerned face she can’t quite place.
We visit pleasantly, when I can make it. Related strangers who don’t know enough about one another to talk about much beyond idle chit chat. Not that she’s up to much chit chat. So I bring Oliver so I don’t have to think of things to say that she won’t hear. I hold my tiny, charismatic giant, and he holds his O. It’s convenient that he holds it, too, because every time she asks his name, we can point to the puzzle piece.
O is for Oliver. “You got him that puzzle, Nana. He loves it so much.”
We don’t know when the funeral will be, but we know it will be soon. Days, according to my aunt. The one who actually bought the puzzle. My parents haven’t said anything yet. Is my dad in denial or pain? Probably both. But my aunt let me know, just in case we wanted to make plans.
Thanks, I texted back not knowing in the least how I could possibly make plans for this new stage of pre-grief I found myself in.
“We’ll do whatever you want,” Nick reassures me, taking Oliver and his O downstairs.
Except I don’t know what I want. It’s hard enough to hear myself on normal days. It’s taken years of therapy and living just to feel confident putting off grocery shopping to do something silly just because. Now, when everyone’s feelings are screaming louder than Oliver without his O, how can anyone expect me to know what I want?
I’ll probably go home first. Take Oliver with me to see Nana one last time. If we get there in time. Stay with my parents. They’ll want to see Oliver and it will make my dad feel better to have us around. Having Oliver around makes everyone feel better.
At the top of my packing list, I write O for Oliver.
This is beautiful Meaghan. My mum has told me that my nana lost her words as I learned mine, she stopped feeding herself as I started. Your narrative shows that contrast between the different life stages, and you, there in the middle.
Yes! i turn 40 and she’s 84, so i truly feel dead center
Such powerful writing, l loved it the way you’ve linked Oliver and your Nana, you’ve portrayed them both so well. So poignant.
Thank you!!! It was the kind of day where it needed to come out!
I had to stop throughout this piece to take a breath at your beautiful writing. So many lines struck me; the line about pleasant memories, the line about unfiltered joy with everything left to discover, the line about Oliver reaching for words and toys… I could keep going. Such a skilful juxtaposing of new life and ending life. Amazing piece Meaghan!
Thank you so, so much 💜 It really means a lot that these lines are landing with you!
There are so many things to say about this. I especially liked the circularity of the 'O' motif / the circle of life, the tension between losing of / gaining of language and knowledge. I thought this was remarkable. Loved your submission again this week.
Thank you! I confess, I didn’t even see the circle of life motif until you brought it up 🤣 It just felt correct. The things we find sometimes!
Yes, such strength in the O and the idea of circles and cycles of life. The contrast between learning words and losing them. Very clever and moving.
Thank you! The losing and learning words was what came to me super clearly after reading Kate’s piece. I’m super pleased it’s landing well with people.
So well done. Very moving and as others have said, the motif of the O is skilfully woven through
Thank you so much. It means so much to me that this is resonating with you all
Beautifully woven piece Meaghan, there's so many layers to the juxtaposition between a new baby and a dying elder. I particularly liked the repeated motif around language - developing it, losing it or struggling to articulate your needs and wants.
Thank you! Their language stuff connected so clearly to me, but my articulation being connected to that felt like something I could only see by writing it out!
This is really, really good Meaghan. There are too many lines for me to pick out, but the thread of O, the juxtaposition of his learning words and Nana losing hers - and having been in that place of pre-grief, of hospice rooms, of strange limbo; now in a place where we have a date, I just felt this so deeply. Thank you for sharing.
Thank you so much. It felt really good coming out. Necessary.
This is very moving.
Thank you 💜 I told you it was a bit heavy!
This is really moving Meeghan and so tightly woven.
Thank you so much. 🙏🏼
Breast is best, didn’t you know? Don’t try to pretend you didn’t say the very same thing to a hundred mothers in the cramped postnatal ward. You with your stethoscope and name badge. You, the midwife.
That was before, of course.
You spoke about the antibodies, the protein, the way - how clever! - the milk tailors itself to a baby’s individual needs. You made it sound simple, all that talk of positioning and attachment, of nose to nipple and a wide-open mouth. You made them think they could fill the marble of their baby’s stomach with ease. Almost certainly, you spouted the line about breastfeeding being free. In fact, didn’t you roll your eyes sometimes when 4AM rolled around on a night shift and a shellshocked mother told you her baby just. wouldn't. latch.
Hypocrite.
Breastfeeding shouldn’t be painful, you used to say. A few strong sucks and the baby will settle into a rhythm.
And then you realised the rhythm was one of razor-sharp dread with a shard of glass chaser. Before you peeled off the breast pad saw your own nipples, cracked and bloody. Before you felt as though you were losing your mind.
Remember how you felt like a fugitive in the supermarket aisles? Certain that each person you passed knew how terrible a mother you were. You could hear their whispers as you laid those tiny green bottles in the trolley behind your sleeping baby. Poor kid, they said. Poisoned. Neglected. Better line up a therapist now.
You were a mother who could offer no sustenance, although you pretended for a while, didn’t you? Sterilising bottles in secret and drip-feeding synthetic nutrition into your baby’s body during the hours you spent alone. Keeping up the illusion you were good when anyone else was around. Hiding your winces. Letting the baby suckle.
There will come a point, you say now in your classes, when you can no longer hide. You will hit a wall.
You can still feel the impact. A miserable day, in every sense. Sheets of rain pouring from a black sky as you lay face down on the bed. What do you want to do? he asked a little impatiently, rocking the baby.
The answer, as always, was walk.
You wrapped up against the weather, the baby tucked snugly under the plastic rain cover, and trod the muddy canal side path until you were drained. Your wrongness exposed.
And in the deluge, he held you. Told you he was sorry.
You asked why, confused by his tenderness in the face of your transgressions. For believing it was free, he said. For believing it was easy.
There is a cost, you tell eager parents-to-be now. And if the cost is your tether to the world, to your sanity, that is too high a price to pay. The baby will not need therapy because you choose to feed them formula. There will be a hundred other things you do that lead them to the therapist’s door, yes, but – I promise – retiring your nipples will not be one of them.
This is so powerful and l feel your anger. My daughter had the same feelings , it was so hard to find the right words to make her feel ok about herself.
I feel it all…the anger, the power, the sadness. Kate said your writing is precise and that is the word for it. Brilliant pacing 💛
Oh how I love an accusatory YOU! This is excellent and relatable Emily. The things we beat ourselves up about.....
This is so powerful, so angry and moving, so precise. So good on that dead weight of simplistic societal expectations. I loved the unexpected resolution of the rainy walk and the conversation with your partner
"razor sharp dread with a shard of glass chaser": Oof this is so powerful, Emily! And his holding you and saying I'm sorry for *your* transgressions - so beautiful.
This line was also a gut punch for me. I could feel it even though I hadn’t experienced it. Amazing!
Came here to say almost exactly the same thing! That line. I was with you from the first word, Emily 💛
After a 5 hour journey which included a taxi, a train and two buses, arriving home should have been a sigh of relief. But bringing a boy home was never going to be easy, it was always going to feel like holding one's breath for an entire weekend.
My parents were very relaxed about the whole thing, even offering that he and I could share the same bedroom despite only just being over the age of consent. It was a clever move on their part because it meant we spent the entire night not moving in the bed for fear that they would hear a creak and feel the need to smile knowingly over breakfast the next morning!
In fact the problem was that they were perhaps a little too relaxed. We were collected from the bus by my father. Climbing into the 15 year old Skoda which sported two different door colours, he spent the 15 minute drive to our house updating us on the progress he was making with clearing a blockage in the septic tank. Apparently my menopausal mother had taken to using baby wipes to deal with her elevated levels of sweating and unwittingly had been flushing them down the toilet.
This, of course, was not exactly the first impression I had been hoping to make, but I assured myself that seeing as the boy hadn’t jumped out of the moving car yet, things could only get better from there on in.
There is no better way to see the flaws in ones home than when you have visitors arriving, and our home sure had flaws! We were in the process of renovating a very old, very dilapidated schoolhouse, and upon opening the front door we were greeted with a vast space of…nothingness. There was no flooring. ‘You’ll need to walk along the floor joists’, my father casually said, as if he was simply talking about keeping off the grass in the local park.
Having navigated our way across the breadth of the house and reaching the relative safety of the stairs we were greeted by our old cocker spaniel, wearing one of my fathers old yellowed vests, held around his waist with one of my mothers multicoloured scarves. My mother followed quickly after and explained that he had cut his belly climbing through a barbed wire fence and the stitches needed to be kept covered. Seemingly the poor dog had left his dignity as well as his fur in the fence that day.
So had my mother as it happens, as she descended the stairs wearing a white floral nightdress with curlers in her hair.
At this point I could no longer bear to look at the boys face, fearing I would see my own horror reflected in his eyes.
The weekend went about as well as one would expect after that, although to be fair to the boy, he did take it all very much in his casual stride. On the train back to boarding school late on Sunday evening, he looked at me with an amused smile and said, ‘it really is no small wonder, that you are the way you are!’. ‘Yes’, I agreed, ‘it’s a huge wonder that I turned out half as good as I did!’.
Great fun and I love the way you described the scene, I can picture it all thanks to your lively descriptions.
This is so good. You describe it so well and love your last line.
Lovely, humorous, all those vivid details. I would happily read on
Yes! More please! Loved the pace and style of this piece 💛
Superb -- I squirmed with you and loved the last line. YES!
I still squirm thinking about it 25 years later 😅
Grief.
We carry it like a rough gem in the heart, slowly polished by blood and tears.
I've returned home from a funeral — one so heart-felt and exquisite, so open to grief and so thankful for the life of the loved one that it was both a blessing to be there, and made the loss more profound.
We're all of us not much more than a small hand print on the skin of time, but in that time we have the chance to love, to leave an impression in the clay of those we touch.
***
I once loved a girl who told me I was not who I seemed but a Moorish princess from 10th century Toledo and she was the Muslim prince who returned to his ancestral Jewish faith when he knew his love would be unrequited.
It started like this —
We are arrayed in rows, desks joined in pairs, twenty-eight eleven-year-old girls in stiff navy-blue pinafores. The girl I share a desk with in this alphabetical arrangement is called Susan and has spread her pencils across the desk. I nudge them back towards her side. At the front of the class another girl, not much taller than me, chats with the teacher as though they are old friends. Fine strawberry-blonde hair, an easy laugh. Mrs G. tells her to choose someone to assist her as the class book-monitor.
She points to me.
I chose you for your plaits, she tells me on the way to the stationary office. If you get out of hand I can pull on them.
I scowl.
She laughs. But really I recognised you — always so small and pale. We’ve been so many people, some famous, some no-one’s heard of. We were most ourselves as Ben Haddaj and Casilda. I always recognise you.
She smiles at my puzzlement. You’ll soon understand.
Over lunch, she asks what my favourite flower is.
Rose, I say. Oh and hawthorn. I love daisies too. They…
Tell me about roses.
I love everything about them. The dog roses in Kirkleatham. I like the way they look so fragile but have big red thorns. And the faeries use the hips to make themselves invisible.
Faeries?
I nod, return to the roses — And the cultivated ones. My dad grows them — they have beautiful names. They’re delicate and fussy about their soil, you have to protect them from greenfly. They’re a lot of work, but special…
Antoine de St. Exupéry, she interupts.
Who?
He wrote The Little Prince. I can see you’ll need a reading list.
It’s the time you have wasted for your rose that makes your rose so important … You become responsible forever for what you’ve tamed.
She grins. Perhaps you’ll tame me.
We role played our way through seven years of schooling...
***
Until I fell in love with a boy who had no romantic notions about who I might be, who set about defining me, who told me my story was so much more mundane...
Those were terrible years. Those were wonderful years. So much grief. The joy of four births, home educating children, walking their paths with them...
Until... after 31 years... he could not tame me. And life began again — alone, not lonely. Until…
***
It started like this:
I'm teaching at a writing residency and one afternoon we take the group up into the hills, above the valley that runs down to Conwy.
A., one of the group on the course, arrives at the broken wall at the same moment as me. Decades ago, when the place was inhabited, there had been a day when the mobile cinema arrived further down the valley. The houses emptied for this annual treat. No-one was home when the dam broke through the wall, flooding every building. Not one life lost.
A. says something about ‘the writing on the wall’ which had not worked out so well for the Chaldean king, Belshazzar. I reply with a misquote of Daniel’s message to the king: weighed, measured, found wanting. And as A. laughs, the slightest glance passes between us…
Then he walks away, down to the lake.
***
I began mentoring his writing.
We began emailing daily, meeting occasionally till I wrote:
A relationship is like a shark. If it doesn’t keep moving forward it will die.
I think we’ve got a live shark on our hands. Hoping you might think so too, but it’s not a threat…
We married in September 2016, two years and five months after the shark email.
***
In 2014 the Marlinsky Opera staged the whole of Wagner’s Ring Cycle in Birmingham. It had only been staged in the UK twice before. The girl I had loved had taught me to love this music and I went with my oldest daughter — four long evenings of extraordinary drama and music.
On the second night I noticed a woman who looked like the woman the girl I’d loved might have become, approached her to ask if she was indeed… She wasn’t. I found it hard to imagine she would not be there, but listening to the music, we were together, somewhere we always are…
I loved reading this Jan; the mysterious love friendship as a child, the cultivation, and what she taught you cleverly interspersed with life, taming, and the shark email.
Thank you Marika. The shark email was definitely a defining moment :)
Beautiful. The pieces and jumps make it feel like a prism of writing and lived experience.
The way you've woven these different fragments of different relationships together works really well Jan.
I loved these fragments, and I so hoped she would be the girl you'd loved.
Thank you. Liza -- as did I