AS YET TO BE

Tag: writing

  • Loss of something familiar

    If I had gone before, I could have remembered

    Lilacs and green after-noons of May;

    (From Sara Teasdale, ‘Late October’)

    It is now feeling slightly autumnal writing this; spring has very much bloomed and gone, we have endured summer’s colours wilting over what has been a concerningly parching summer.

    Four months now since Cali left us, and for the first time in fourteen years, there was nobody sleeping beneath the lilac this time, where a small indentation of her remains in the grass.

    ‘What greater gift than the love of a cat?’ asks Dickens, and as someone who has grown up always with at least one nearby, I naturally agree. The love of a cat is one built from patience, trust, and is quietly earned. It is one appreciated on the worst of days, and sometimes when there really is nothing or no-one else.

    When we collected a very small kitten-Cali, she was actually watching Coronation Street. She could fit in the palm of my dad’s hand, and I remember printing a picture of her from the computer that weekend to bring into school. I can’t remember exactly which one, but it may well have been similar to the one below.

    Cali was something of a good luck charm for me (not just with her calicoed associations), a familiar, often my nurse, therapist, muse, companion and confidante. She saw me through life from eleven to twenty-five – from just before my year six SATs, all my time in secondary school, to beyond – sitting in on my online (lockdown) university exams and waiting at home during my first job. She helped me through many firsts.

    It was only towards the end that our roles switched and I was, instead, her nurse. During what was a generally low year of my life, caring for her was one of the only things on my calendar, and with how it/I was, it was a regular cycle of her improving, worsening again, and me convincing myself that each vet trip would be the last one.

    A lot of this time was filled with a pre-emptive grief, I suppose, which is why there is a particular emptiness surrounding the actual loss. I often get sad over how I never got a ‘proper’ goodbye, yet I seem to have prepared myself for one on many occasions before.

    And, at the same time, a guilt; a feeling I never fully honoured her, partly for how much of a close part of me she was. Like, why do I feel ashamed about spending time now with other cats? Why did it take me so long to write this all down? Am I worried I will forget her?

    I’ve found part of my grief is a feeling that I simultaneously have nothing to remember her by, physically, or that there is no full closure, with how quickly it all happened in the end. However, since moving away I have realised I am actually surrounded by reminders of her and seemingly carry parts of her with me every day. Suddenly, the cat hairs on my clothes are no longer a nuisance, and the things I purchased or made with her in mind bear a new significance.

    Cat, by Gwen John: I received this on a card from my brother shortly after starting uni – it is on the wall of my new room now

    Yet, in the same sense, it is also those small things that crop up occasionally and tend to catch me unprepared, as I don’t think I’m quite used to her being gone. I always used to sign cards to family from me and her, I’ve caught myself still saying I have two cats. I sometimes still expect to see her when I visit home. There’s only one food bowl put out in the kitchen now.

    Referring to her in the past tense is also something that still feels unnatural.

    She loved to bask in the sun, especially when the garden patio tiles absorbed the heat, and when she needed some shade you would spot her either in the border or beneath the lilac. She was such a gentle, loving, often silly cat, who always knew exactly when you needed her company.

    Cali on the garden wall

    Her trips to the vets dealt her a fair share of battle scars and hairdos, for which we were often reminded of Bagpuss:

    The most important
    The most beautiful
    The most magical
    Saggy old cloth cat in the whole wide world

    […]

    Baggy, and a bit loose at the seams
    But Emily loved him

    For all of the extra time that she gave us (years, weeks, days), I am so grateful.

    I’m not sure I’ll ever be able to fully commemorate such a special (important, beautiful, magical) cat, but this is at least a start. Jules Verne (I believe) wrote that, ‘Cats come into your house to teach you about affection, they leave to teach you about the loss.’

    I don’t think you can ever fully anticipate the feeling of losing a pet, but it does make you appreciate the time you have with them even more.

  • when the sun strikes me like a gong

    It’s a cold day today, but in a spring way, and I love you.

    (24th March, 1937; Letters to Véra by Vladimir Nabokov)

    The slog of January to very early Feb was one, for us, submerged in greyness. The first month of the year seemed to last forever, yet with no real sense of the days passing by. Just fog!

    Our vitamin D levels dwindled as there was absolutely no visible sun; those select mornings when it did make a short appearance saw us all vastly uplifted.

    It was a Valentine’s Day visit to Whitby with family that I only properly remember a completely blue sky… I have a fond recollection of a couple sitting in a bus stop, sunbathing in five-degree cool. Romantic!

    Blue sky through Whitby Abbey

    As I experience more years (having recently (reluctantly) turned twenty-five), I grow increasingly impatient for spring’s arrival. Not just for the daffodils, lambs and chocolate eggs, but more so for the longer days and increased likelihood of sunshine. With longer evenings on their way, I feel less inclined to convince myself I’m running out of time.

    Over winter, I wilt – a plant without what it needs – I’ve come to find the transition back into green, yellows and pinks more and more welcome. Everything shifts, in a flowery sort of way (colour comes back).

    A usual indication of the change in season is our cat basking on the garden patio. She’ll only do this when the conditions are just right, and it seems that today the stone is at optimum temperature:

    Cali in the afternoon sun

    This is handy, as it often lets us know whether it’s suitable to let the tortoise out for a stroll too.

    Barley doing her yoga on the patio tiles

    A bit of natural sun makes all the difference to a heat lamp for her, which I’m sure we can all agree with (I’m terribly anti-Big-Light these days). I don’t know if tortoises contain or produce serotonin, but their heat-seeking (survival) instincts resonate strongly with me.

    It may sound extreme, but things simply feel more doable when the Sun is out. I have all the instincts of a hibernating animal, who has been cooped up much too long and all of a sudden feels much lighter (in more senses than one).

    Perhaps this is just a reflection on my grasping at any sense of optimism nowadays, if merely a bit of warmth through my joints: life feels that bit more liveable, I don’t feel half as unwell as the cloudy day before, and for some reason my body works a bit better than usual. I feel suddenly inspired, as though I’ve quite literally had some light switched on somewhere in my brain.

    Seeing Project Hail Mary at the weekend (enjoy it!) seems to have inspired me to think about our Sun and perhaps worship it a bit more than before. This, and a particularly glare-y bus journey home.

    I suggest we all pause and bask (responsibly) for a bit.

    (Title taken from ‘I have to tell you’ by Dorothea Grossman)

  • For old-souled seeking inner children

    View from the roof terrace, Puerto de la Cruz

    This year I set out to truly understand and come to terms with myself, which has naturally led to reflecting on the aspects of my childhood that have ultimately shaped me.

    Growing up neurodivergent and anxious, I have often felt an imposterish sense that I’ve been handed a faulty manual. I’m haunted by an immense fear that one day, a stranger will turn to me, point, and tell me I’ve been doing life wrong – and everyone has noticed. 

    This was recently tested before our flight to Tenerife over a month ago, when I had my hand luggage searched at about 5:30am in Manchester Airport. It is moments such as these that you convince yourself that maybe you are carrying things you shouldn’t, maybe you did fill it with the most embarrassing, incriminating, items, maybe you are the worst person on earth…

    But I had only packed a few hours beforehand (I all-nightered to leave at 4am). As a fan of lists and puzzles with photographic memory, I had a pretty decent idea of what was in my bag.

    That makes it sound like I passed the check with flying colours (what is it with me treating life as some big exam!). This was roughly how it went. My bag is black and white, polka-dotted.

    Security 1: Is this your bag?

    Me: Yes, it is.

    Security 1: Did you pack this bag yourself?

    Me: Yes, I did. (I know I definitely did, but what if I actually didn’t)

    Security 1: Is everything in this bag yours?

    Me: Yes, it is. (Am I sure???)

    Security 1: Is there any chance somebody could have taken and/or added something to your bag?

    Me: No. (I’ve been clinging to this bag since 3:45am, but what if…)

    My deer-in-headlights expression (more lately rabbit-in-headlights from my driving instructor) is on by now.

    Security 1: Can you list what you have packed in this bag for me?

    Me: (Instructions. I’m good at those. I literally just packed this bag) I have my hairbrush, Nintendo Switch, sunglasses, cap (ARE THESE THINGS YOU NORMALLY TAKE ON HOLIDAY???), toothbrush, books… headphones…

    Security 1: Okay. If I were to ask you about two or three rectangular things towards the right-hand-side of your bag, could you think what they are?

    Me: Either books, or… (oh, wait). I packed some card games.

    Security 1: Can you remember what card games?

    Me: (Very aware of people behind me at this point) Cat Top Trumps and The Chase (ITV) card game.

    Security 2 then proceeds to remove everything in my bag and search them (the books page by page… my poor secondhand Wimsey). This is when I’d forgotten to mention my childhood teddy, Lucy the lamb, is also in there. She got swabbed for drugs. I kind of wanted to spontaneously combust at that point. Security 2 did apologise for that.

    Following an all-clear and a fairly deflated departure from Security, my dad suggested they maybe wanted to check my bag because they were astounded at how a 24-year-old could have a bag filled by a child and grandmother simultaneously.

    I was worried that maybe they thought my Tetris style of packing was too neat, and therefore a red flag. I have since reassured myself that no, it wasn’t my Crocs, or my bad eye contact, but simply a random check.

    A “Build a Bel” Starter Pack, by me

    There is nothing like a good bit of self-scrutiny following having your belongings searched and representation of your personality quite literally laid out in a tray, piece by piece. This debacle occurred at about the same time an online trend of (predominantly AI-generated) Me Starter Packs was circling: see my (drawn!!!!! by hand!!!!!) contribution above. Some of the objects pictured featured in my hand luggage.

    Aside from its relevance to the mortifying ordeal of being known, I brought up the airport scene for purposes of reflecting on material identity. Not exactly to say that I’m best described by card games and a toy lamb, but more in the way the things we own, inherit, keep, treasure, capture aspects of our lives/passions/younger selves.

    I am a person with interests (special interests) of multiple shapes and sizes, yet also one who when asked about hobbies will draw a complete blank, despite hyperfixated years attentively studying actor Personal Life sections or rewatching the same series on loop.

    So, I think if I’m ever asked again, I might tell them about the bag search – both to jog my memory, and hopefully spark at least one common interest.

    I may poke fun at myself, but a lot of becoming who I am now has involved re-embracing the things I enjoyed as a little girl and might have packed away when teenagerhood convinced me that everything was embarrassing.

    Of course I wake up finally

    thinking, how wonderful to be who I am,

    made out of earth and water,

    my own thoughts, my own fingerprints —

    all that glorious, temporary stuff.

    (From Mary Oliver, ‘On Meditating, Sort Of’)

    I was labelled an old soul on a number of occasions growing up, which I took then as more a comment on my hobbies (arts, crafts, baking, watching daytime detective TV…). I have of course read more into it now I’m older and realised it ties more into emotional maturity and oftentimes introversion, which has led to other discoveries regarding the past ten years or so.

    Whether it be due to exposing myself to the internet at much too young an age (11-12), being bullied at school (I recently found some online journals I had written detailing times I was – I seem to have either shut most out or forgot), or whatever anxiety chucked in the way when all I wanted was to pass my GCSEs and A Levels; I would probably say that I grew up quickly in some areas.

    I can’t say confidence blossomed, or a social life, but more so that I have, for a long time now, felt hyper-aware and almost constantly on-guard.

    Something I have tried (and am trying) to do as of late is actively seek to heal/re-seek my inner child. This, and challenging embarrassment. Having spent a portion of life pretending to be someone, something I’m not (neurotypical, heterosexual, modern pop-cultured), what’s the harm in finding some happiness in old hobbies?

    I’ve started reading previously adored children’s books before bed. I returned to the Brownie unit I was at as a child and now volunteer there. I’ve started drawing and sewing again. I routed through the stacks of boxes in my childhood bedroom and put out some trinkets I treasured as a girl. 

    A wall in my bedroom, my space for twenty-four years

    After a long period of cluttered minimalism (meaning this in the sense my space has been simultaneously undecorated, personality-less, yet a mess), I’ve found a lot of enjoyment in bringing the colour back. I believe in dopamine dressing – similarly in dopamine decorating!

    Whether it be merely the return of sun and heat, or that I’m making some positive steps forward, I have found real comfort in taking life slowly, feeling less pressure, and allowing myself to just be. 

    Try it!

  • In this short Life; knowing oneself

    I would like to wish any readers some rather belated New Year wishes. As if by magic, January has frustratedly flown by, and my next post comes to you much later than I had planned – or, at least – hoped.

    The title of this post is partly taken from one of Emily Dickinson’s Envelope Poems, which I am always reminded of at the end of a year. ‘In this short Life that only lasts an hour/How much – how little – is within our power’… She writes of living life to the full, how much can change, happen, exist, within a life, contracted to an hour. 

    Emily Dickinson, Envelope Poems (W. W. Norton & Company, 2016), p. 30

    But, it is important to note ‘How much – how little’ we can control. There is so much pressure put on the figurative refresh a new year brings, which I have known only too well.

    I mentioned in my previous (and only) blog post that I am often filled with big ideas that don’t necessarily happen. I have semi-unknowingly proven this, for over the past three weeks I kicked myself at least twice a day for not writing anything new. Yet, simultaneously, I did expect this to happen. It is no secret that cold January and its associated SAD hits many – I found myself snowed under, in more ways than one…

    The snow from my [Bed]Room with a View, last week

    I could easily spiral into frustration and kick myself again for the lack of productivity, but that is not the point I would like to make.

    This clinging to the notion of wiping a slate clean, of starting anew, has become cyclical; not only yearly, but daily, weekly, hourly. I am guilty of trying to combat my Sunday scaries with an ‘I’ll start on Monday’ before bed, or setting timers or rewards for doing the bare minimum. But, I’ve come to terms with the fact that this rarely works. For me, that is.

    It was actually a random Tumblr post by a since-deactivated user that struck me a few weeks ago. It said:

    NEVER LET YOURSELF BE STOPPED BY WHAT IT WOULD HAVE BEEN LIKE IF YOU STARTED EARLIER!!!!! THE ONLY TIME WE HAVE IS NOW

    Its aggressive uppercase has stayed in my mind, and has since become the angel on my shoulder, opposite the constant irritation of self-loathing I get whenever I am less productive than hoped. It is only too often that I upset myself with what-could-have-been-if-I-started-earlier. Instead, it is about time I started to congratulate myself more for doing something, regardless of how long it took. I shouldn’t be ashamed for working a particular way.

    Having grown up through varying stages of self-esteem, self-motivation, and self-awareness, I am only now beginning to understand how I work. Harking back, I worked much too hard on my A-Levels (lack of sleep and self-care actually led to a hypothyroidism diagnosis at eighteen). The pressure I put on myself through a perfectionist’s fear of failure and generalised anxiety wasn’t great, needless to say.

    Being quite the opposite of busy today, I cannot fathom how I ran on fumes for so long. However, it was questions like these that led me to stop and remind myself of various challenges I have faced since I was a teen; the pandemic, processing trauma, two broken arms… I feel as though I’ve come out of five years of living in survival mode.

    It was primarily a COVID-affected university experience that helped me recognise how poorly I worked from home; I found myself close to fifty pre-recorded lectures behind at one point in my second year (2020-21). Prior to then, I had never considered that I could be neurodivergent, and that the lack of structure was simply not helpful.

    Skipping to now, I am fairly certain I’m AuDHD (and characteristically procrastinating seeking diagnoses). If I had had more understanding of myself and what works for me years before, I might not have had so much inward anger. But: it is not worthwhile (yet) to reflect on what could have been (watch Rick Glassman discuss his late autism diagnosis with Rainn Wilson).

    As I already said, I have only lately been coming to terms with my brain. This reframing of my mind combined with various rounds of CBT, and generally a lot of contemplation has assisted me in knowing my limits, triggers, routines.

    I now know what is unsustainable for me and how exercise or work makes me feel better. I now understand that it’s better I stop and sleep, start tomorrow, instead of staying up late, accomplishing little, and inevitably hating myself more. Was I unproductive today, or did my body actually just need a rest? Am I actually incapable of getting this done, or have I just not eaten/taken a break/slept enough?

    Some fireworks at Belvoir Castle, August 2024

    Now, I would like to say that affirmations such as these have single-handedly fixed the relationship I have with myself. The unpredictability of chronic and mental illness, the nature of life generally, are constant challenges to that. I cannot in any way pretend that my life is perfect because I’ve kind of ‘figured me out’, because I haven’t really yet. I am still a burnt out unemployed twenty-something who hasn’t actually left the house properly in over a week.

    There is a lot to go by way of living better – and the best way for me to start that is to reassure myself that although life may sometimes feel like it’s passing me by, it is not worthwhile brooding over could-haves. Amidst adhering to real deadlines, there are some things that will come when ready – me included.