I'm still thick in a fug of snot and snivels and aches... It gives the world an odd, fuzzy quality so that I end up feeling not quite in the world. My thinking gets muddy, my dreams seem to lap at the edges of waking, needing me to shake my head or blink in an attempt to find certainty in which world is real.

And I'm not good at being ill! I know, I know, what a ridiculous thing to say - who is good at it?! I swing between feeling shamefully sorry for myself one minute and frustrated with it and determined to ignore it the next - today's bout of ignoring how ill I feel involved a fairly major (for an ill person!) clean and tidy of the house. Needless to say, it left me totally exhausted and feeling far worse this evening than I did yesterday. Foolish woman...

I'm trying to unpick some of these waking dreams and strange thoughts and feelings of the last few days. I've felt a sadness - not a heavy sadness, nor threatening, but a sadness none the less... Perhaps it's just slef-pity at my depleted state... I have regrets, and that, I think is the crux of it. I am not a person who has had regrets - there have been times of horror in my life that I still do not regret, but all of a sudden I have them. Not about horrors or dramatic things - mainly about spending such a long time allowing myself to remain unhappy, when it has been so transformational for me to come here and become happy again. Regrets feel sad, especially after so long without them. I wonder if they go away over time; if one can work at letting go of them and them be gone; or if they just are, despite one's efforts - if they exist despite me and are just something I have to learn to live with...

Nothing seems to soothe today... not honey and lemon, not the big bowl of home-made meatballs and tomato and garlic sauce, not a hot bath, not knitting, not even FBs cuddles... There's an unease in me that I can't quite fathom. I think maybe I have unleashed something in acknowledging that there would be space for a little passion and desire within me - that in noticing that, in letting the thoughts exist outside myself it spirals and grows in ways which, truth be told, I'm not comfortable with! No, there's more to it than that - there was news yesterday that tapped into those feelings - not something that is mine to share here, but suffice to say it seems to have awakened a sleeping dragon in me... But then again, I can trust little in this state where reality and fantasy or dream seem to be so hard to distinguish through my fuggy wee head...

I'm ok. Just processing...

On colds and self-indulgence

The sky is heavy with the weight of wet snow. It began as rain this morning, but I noticed it was falling thicker than water on the windscreen and by 9.30 it was definitely rain no longer, but fat, wet snowflakes. It isn't settling yet, but the air has grown steadily colder all morning, so there's time yet. I have guiltily let the central heating thermostat creep up a couple of notches as we've struggled to feel warm. But the damp seems to find infinate ways into this house and I wonder if we will ever feel truly warm and dry until the seasons move on again!

The world feels grey and heavy and my own vision is clouded and weighted by a cold that has left me not only with sinuses full and sore, but every joint in my body (even the top joints of my fingers!) aching and complaining at even the small movements. FB too has been under the weather and I'd thought maybe he was out the other side - perhaps he is but emotionally he's all over the place. This morning the pair of us met headlong in a horrible combination of both of our sadness and heaviness and less-than-top-form-ness. And I'm sad and I'm sorry that these moments happen, when my energies are depleted and I haven't the resources to meet him as he needs me to. It isn't awful, it isn't some terrible thing, I haven't failed him, but neither have I been enough, and it's a sad old feeling...

And sadness hangs doesn't it?I feel an emptiness today, a space inside that would really like to feel that it contained something... I am very loved but I no longer remember what it is to be desired and sometimes it would be nice to remember what it is to crackle and fizz under another's touch, to know that someone somewhere is anticipating me, to know warmth and softness and hunger and searching... I need not for another, but it doesn't stop me wanting at times!

I'm looking for a place to root myself again as my cold leaves me feeling floaty and ungrounded, I'm trying to catch a hold of that contentment that usually holds me so well, I'm trying hard not to launch into flights of fancy, or to entertain fantasies that can't sustain, trying to find a route back into my body even though it doesn't feel a very welcoming place today!

Oh what a self-indulgent post! Forgive me! Bare with me - I'll be home again in myself very soon, just need to allow myself a little wonder and a little wallow!

Cold days and a lovely long boy...

It's been days full of icy cold, breath freezing as it rises, pale moons that never set, bloody red sunrises and lilac, pink and grey sunsets...

We had a walk with some friends on Beverley Westwoods - FB had fun spotting things (most exciting find:- dead leaves!) and finding dens to play in. But the cold chased us home after an hour or so. (mental note: where can I get thermal long johns to fit a coming-up 4 year old? Or maybe I should just buy him some tights... I used to when he was a baby...)

He's growing so fast - clothes not long new to him are getting shorter in leg and sleave. He's a great long boy - always was. I shall never forget the moment he was lifted out of me, held up for me to see, and as they lifted he just seemed to keep on coming and coming and coming... I thought 'where on earth did all that baby come from?', this great long, lean boy being lifted out of the hole they'd made in my belly...

And now here he is with all that fine straw-coloured hair, charging round the woods, jumping on my bed and growing out of his clothes... Looking like his mama...

... And his dad...

Christmas 2008

One of the things I missed during the years in Wales was the big family Christmases of my childhood, and later, after FB was born, the way I felt about family was so absolutely altered, and I longed not just for a big family Christmas, but my big family. Last year was the first year that I came home for Christmas after possibly as mny as 15 years away - I had promised from the beginning that my child's 2nd Christmas was to be with my family. This year, FB's third Christmas (and possibly the first that he will have real, lasting memories of), home is here, our family are here. There's no awful long journey to get here, no dread as the day of leaving approaches, no packing, no upheaval, no tears...

Our Christmas was full and joyful - FB was quietly excited, polite, appreciative and an absolute delight to be with! We both loved hanging out with most of our family (there's only one of my brothers we've not yet seen), eating wonderful food, playing together, chatting together... FB and I had the most magical and gentle Christmas morning together before heading off to my parents for a couple of less quiet and gentle, but no less happy days.

And now it's over for another year and that's ok - the magic we had will carry us through til next time around, and I hope I've sewn the seeds for FB of some childhood Christmas memories for him that are as glorious, magical and filled with Love as my own are.

It's been a strange few weeks - I was unsettled, restless, without ever really understanding why... FB and I prickled and sparked at each other; one minute playfully and the next more spikily (after which I would berate myself and feel ever shittier...). I felt lost - under the stresses of beginning work outside my home; under the feelings of there being not enough room in my head; under sleeping badly; under the expectations of others; under my own confused and confusing feelings - a sudden brief, but powerfully deep longing for a partner/lover the knocked me sideways and sent me spinning into tears at unexpected moments for a few days; under the weight of my desire to mother more children; under my foolish (and thankfully also brief) indulgence in feelings of regret and if only; under the endless rounds of washing, cleaning, cooking, shopping...

And then on Friday I turned 35 and you know all those things began to unravel and look a little less tangled, a little less dense, a little less big... This is a very new thing for me, to feel any sort of anxiety or trepidation about ageing - and I don't feel those things in a conscious way, but I notice what has happened here! Part of it is context - finding myself here more than 10 years since the beginning of my last relationship, and recognising that if you had asked my then 24 year old self where she imagined she'd be at 35, it would be very unlikely to be here! It's been a hard year, full of harsh choices and brave decisions and whole heap of shit to deal with, and I do feel on the cusp of new and exciting things. 35 is fine - I need to remember not to allow myself to get into looking backwards (what I could/should/might have done differently - the point is I didn't, but you know, I could now!) - I am happy to embrace who and what I am now as I emerge from whatever chrysalis it is I've inhabited. The Solstice has passed and I feel already the barely perceptible shift in energy,the miniscule first movements as we turn back towards the light... I turn with the Earth - towards the light, towards the gathering energy, still deep, deep down beneath the soil, the barest little quiver, but rising, rising, and knowing the pace will gather and push us up and out...

Visitors have been abound this weekend and deserve a mention because they brought with them Love and affirmation, inspiration and hawthorn jelly... The love of my boy, my family and my oldest friend and his beautiful partner - all that I needed after my little wobble!

So my little world turns onward, the path a little clearer again, the light a little brighter, my poor wee slow head a little less busy and my heart light and full - loved and loving.

There have been more spectacular evening skies - like a little compensation for the shorter days in this last long march towards the Solstice... There is still ice along the lane; sometimes just a little slick, unnoticeable, to slip on as you walk, sometimes a puddle, shattered like glass, small triangles thrown outward to freeze again in some other spot... The morningtimes are glorious too, but I have to confess that the cold has a tendency to keep me in bed - cuddled up with FB with the blankets pulled up to our ears until we have no choice but to brave the world for pees, clothes, breakfast...

My days spin on through work and domesticity and the huge efforts of concentration it feels like it takes for me to feel even vaguely on top of things. It will get easier, I know, but dear me, it feels like hard work just now! Coming home in the dark and the cold and feeling like sleep but there's a small person to play with, bellies to fill, washing, dishes, cleaning to be done, hot water bottles to fill, stories to read, kisses to be had... I feel there's too little room left for creativity - either for myself or room to come up with exciting things to share with FB. It'll come, it'll come, I have only to catch my stride and settle into a new order.

FB has been poorly - we both have suffered today with the minimal sleep we managed last night until he finally gave up late this afternoon and climbed up onto my knee and allowed his poor, hot little body to relax onto mine and his watery eyes to close. My heart reaches out to him - those flushed cheeks set on a sad, pale face, his lips sore and cracked from licking and rubbing, and his nose chapped from wiping the almost permanent canldes of snot there... His breath rattles in his chest and he snores softly, uncomfortably... My poor boy... And yet it can feel such a joyous treat to have him there, his little body against mine, his hot face pressed against my chest, to be able to watch him sleep, to stroke his head, to just be with him without needing to think, or respond to anything or do or be anything at all - just me holding my boy, being nothing but his mother, nothing but Love... Why would I want anything more?

It's been a funny few days - I've been anticipating again and filling brim-full of anxieties and fears in the process. I realise just how much my confidence about my abilities beyond these walls and my own little family has slipped away over recent years and all of a sudden I found myself about to start a new job with the feeling that I wasn't sure I was capable of it at all! I tried so hard yesterday evening to feel peaceful and calm, but nothing seemed to quell the feeling I had of having made a terrible mistake that was going to let people down dreadfully...

It was, of course, fine. I have a lot to learn - about how not to get wound up into such a state for starters, but also about little things like how to dress for work and still feel like myself, how to organise myself better so that there's quick and easy meals planned for work days, how to get us both up and sorted in the mornings without it feeling like a horrible rush... But it feels good. I'm over the dreadful hurdle of the first day, I'll have a pay packet in December and am earning the money that FB and I need, and it looks like it's going to be an engaging, challenging, interesting and worthwhile job. The world is good.

Beyond that, there are all sorts of thoughts and ideas, and this wonderful landscape to hold them, ground them (and me). Last night we drove home as the sun turned down towards a low bank of heavy black cloud that seemed to add a vast city-scape to the usually level horizon. The higher, paler cloud above was flooded with orange light so that the horizon turned into a sprawling black metropolis engulfed in raging fire... And then a bright sliver of moon hung in the little birch tree at the front of the house - FB called from his bedroom - he'd gone up to look for starts in the gathering dark - 'it's a moon, a moon, a moon!'. So excited! How wonderful this little boy whose face lights up because he's seen the moon hanging outside his window! I tried to photograph it, but it didn't work. I'll put it here anyway beause the sky is such a lovely blue...

I have thoughts I feel I shouldn't have. Or rather, little longings that I should not have entertained because they are not yet attainable... Thoughts about a bigger home, more children, about how a little passion really wouldn't go amiss... Push them away, push them away, all in good time...I love what I have, andit really is enough, and I am not ungrateful... Think of it as ambition... I am still, you see, sitting and waiting in that pumpkin patch!

And snow again, and more forecast - it feels very cold this evening, despite my layers. There were spectacular tales in the office today of how much snow there might be tomorrow (and a contingency plan to work at home for those of us who might not get through) and I can't help but feel a little excited at the thought of lots of snow - it is so beautiful and it does make the world an even more magical place...