one weird peg bag

I realise that the number one reason why self help books such as, Men are from Mars, Women are from Venus, totally fail to deliver (despite the helpful content) is that men just don't bother fucking reading them. Women may, and then all nod their heads, oh yes, this is exactly it! The men just can't be arsed. You have 50% who can't be bothered. Some women might hysterically feel this is yet another example that they, the men, just don't want to save this (now obviously doomed) relationship. They may try and convince their man to read it, fail and then argue miserably about it, making it a book your man will now never ever want to read for its own merits, only ever to keep you happy. Boring situation. And I reckon most couples would really want to be stationed a few planets away from each other by the time this point is reached. Or like my lazy Man Reader who tells me to paraphrase, and try to do it quickly please, but he did this with all parenting, health and dog training books I have ever attempted to foist upon him, (it's not just a grudge against the self help section). Perhaps therein lies the problem - you can't use self help in a multiple person situation, like a relationship. Unless both are equally keen, in which I case I’d say not to bother – after all if you have this in common there’s a fair chance of other commonalities of interest existing - I’d say you have decent enough relationship.



And if someone tried to get me to read a book by telling me how great it was I'd be perverse and not want to. Like the time my dad enthusiastically gave me The Hobbit when I was 10, it took another 20 years before I eventually picked it up. I think people are just like that. Perverse. But hey! Here's a self help book you need to read! That's never gonna work. Not in a million. It irks me no end though that it's always women reading the save-the-relationship books. Just, yk... by the way. I swear, men don't read this shit! Unless you have already packed your bags and are half way out the door before they notice and by then, well they could read it out loud, with tears and exclamation marks! in their best Stephen Fry voice and I doubt it'd be moving enough to warrant your unpacking. My new normal when considering the above type of book situation is going to be: do men do this shit? Then I'll decide. I'm not going to stop wearing my bra or breastfeeding or hanging out the laundry (well so what? I like doing it!), or any of the nice stuff that comes hand in hand with being a woman, but other stuff, well I might start asking if blokes would bother, and if not, then why am I? Maybe self-help for relationships is not the best example.... but things that I don't like doing and that don't serve me, then fuck it. Shaving anyone? Whoops. Well men do do that. But they don't need to, I happen to love beards. Armpit beards too. Love em.



In the scheme of things men, well you wouldn’t want to be without them, fairly often. There’s sex of course, but other stuff too. Take cutting the grass, I’m really glad I don’t need to do that. Men come in so handy in the summer months. Sometimes things like lawnmowers can be perplexing.

Me: Wow come and look at this guy! He’s mowing his lawn.... in the rain!!! He’s a goner; he must be a psycho with a death wish.
Him: It’s a petrol mower.
Me: Yeah whatever, isn’t he just crazy though?!!
Him: It’s a petrol mower.
Me: (Getting bored now by the repetitive nature of discourse and feeling the need to get right to the heart of it all). He’s going to ELECTROCUTE himself! Whoa! Watch out stoopid dude!
Him: It’s a petrol mower.
Me: Jesus! What does that have to do with anything? I’m off to tell Felix, he’ll be crazy about this crazy guy too.... (Because being 8 years old he really will be and we will fall about together in anticipation of the electrocution I promise is just about to happen.... if this guy isn’t amazingly lucky).



Then later I think.... oh yeah. Petrol Mower. And then an even *tinnier* voice – but couldn’t he still electrocute himself? Just a tiny bit? I shall ask.... someone, if courage ever strikes (or I don’t forget – more likely an occurrence). In fact I am sure this came up before once with The Man and he did Explain All, and I forgot the next time I saw someone mowing in the rain and got all excited again. There are HUGE gaps in my education. I blame not being home educated. Of course.



We are on holiday right now; you'd think I'd be off my soapbox for just a minute. Same thing always happens when we go away; like I get here and then get ill. I just spent three days in a haze in and out of bed, runny nose, foggy brained. Glands like potatoes in my neck. I blame the mad-stress packing-quickly syndrome and mega dose of travelling with men, children and animals. I need to conk out upon arrival. Not get up at 6am walk the dog and then wash the kitchen floor, which was how the first day here started and after which I fell back into bed unable to get out of it again. Plus I had a filling (in just a tooth) and now I swear my mouth is in more pain than before, my jaw and everything. It’s bizarre. Then it comes and then goes away and I forget all about it. Tooth pain is like that.



The man is similarly affected, unable to switch from his hyper work mode; he takes about a week for the cross over. Alternately grumpy, then hyper happy, busy and then asleep mouth with open on the sofa by 1pm. The dog follows me around tripping me up. People comment how cute she is the way she's my shadow. Really? She follows me to the bathroom. I am going to be like that crazy lady on the dog TV programme who let her dog sit by the bath and lick soap from her legs soon. I'll give up, I am sure and she'd happily lick soap from my legs.



This is car travel from both me and her. Blissful for only one of us. The other gets leg cramp and licked to death ankles.





Isaac chooses to help me with the pegging out of clothing; here mother let me help you – take a peg! He is the weirdest peg bag I ever had.



But there is still the beach. And when you have a beach to visit you can pretty much forget everything else. I remember why we came, it’s the beach.

eternal, blink and it' gone

Last time I looked
I don't think it was returned

this is the last time
I always said

some things never die
try try try

always when you strip bark from a tree
just to look, there is a whiteness

a delicate shock
and you can never take it back

or glue things in place
grind it to dust under your shoe

this is the last time
I will say these words, even to myself

smeared and ugly, the cut throat beauty of sunset
so you can't turn away

try, just try

oh simple things, where have you gone

Here. Simple things in abundance. When time stops (I feel like screaming, or running) and I worry about The Big Things I can always find (force) the head space to look for simplicity. Then what happens is I stop giving a shit about the big things. Debt-sh-met... try it. Go and look at the bark on the first tree you see, touch it. Look at how that tree just *is*. It's not going any place, it's spending it's whole time right here, right now. I find trees so cool. Half the time I don't know what other humans have decided to name them, and I don't much mind. I don't so much hug them as admire them, try to emulate them maybe. Oh simple thing, where have you gone? Lost and found, all in a tree.

No tree photos or anything, didn't even intend to start talking about trees, but I do have some photos of simple things from my simple little life.

Will I ever get to bathe alone? When I do will I miss these days?



Kitchen babes. Wearing our tea towel aprons.





Best thing I ever did was buy everyone their own mp3 player. And DJ headsets. Now I really want my own. Maybe not in pink... red? Hopefully our county length journeying will be less noisy (praying, actually, on my knees that it might be so).



Pup is growing... and Esmé is still Mistress Beloved of Ye Faithful Pup. Like every other soul in the house, her bidding is a requirement (never optional).





Isaac joined the kayaking club. He was finally old enough (10.5 yrs old), he loves it. We live literally, on the River Wye, most folk here have a canoe or two, it was inevitable the children here would want to do it solo, family canoes are just not as cool... So glad for him :)

health and biscuits

For years and years I struggled
just to love my life. And then

the butterfly
rose, weightless, in the wind.
"Don't love your life
too much," it said,

and vanished
into the world.

Verse 7, One or Two Things, Dream Work, 1986, Mary Oliver


I made some yummy gluten free biscuits. Again. I was supposed to be doing this paleo type thing where I skip most to all carbs. But honestly this urge comes over me of late and it makes me very happy to eat a biscuit.

When I was first diagnosed with an auto immune condition I came home and googled it. The first link I clicked on very negligently (and wrongly) claimed that not many people live 6 months past diagnosis. I was out of my mind with shock. The man and I were blank with despair and there was not a thing I wouldn't do to stay alive. (Um, except take the chemo drugs they offered me, to those I said no). I instead radically changed my diet. Cold turkey I went from a regular diet to totally sugar, dairy and grain free. I was so paranoid I wouldn't even eat sweet potato so worried was I about blood sugar levels rising from the carby vegetables.... I was on steroids for a week and told myself the hunger was false and caused by the drugs so I drastically cut back on my intake of foods. In fact I found it so hard in those first few weeks to find actual foods to eat I doubt I ate much at all. This radical detox combined with weight loss (toxins are generally store in fat so when you loose fat quick you can often feel very ill due to the extra circulating in your blood). I did. I felt very ill for months. Although I wouldn't really admit it to anyone other than The Man. He knew. His opinion was that anything I wanted to try or do was good with him. He supported me 100% with anything I wanted to do to get and stay well (which included trips to quack Harley Street practitioners, to multi hundred pound supplement regimes). We both felt pretty desperate. Then. The uber anxiety I felt, the super sensitivity to every little thing I felt in my body and the anxiety it provoked began to wane because..... I had started to meditate. The books I read around that time and the guided meditations I listened to allowed me to 'let go' of my fears for the future, reminding me that the only time any of us ever ever get to live is right now. This very moment. Our lives are made up of moments. When do you ever live in any other time than right now? You don't. And the best thing is: you can *always* handle the right now. Always. And it always passes. And with this knowledge came relief and a relaxing. And I started to feel better. I literally felt myself breathe out. I started seeing the little things that make up life and notice that I wasn't thinking so much, living so much in that huge anxiety gap/chasm created by my mind in which I was perpetually terrified about the distant future, the now and then and the big black space it in between. The nothingness and terror. I began having acupuncture too around this time and still continued with the diet. Still am. Here I am 2.5 years after diagnosis and I really do feel in better health than I have most of my adult life. I don't read the articles and medical journals I once vigorously trawled, day after day. I unjoined the support groups because they were just filled with desperate people trying the whole concoction of Pharmacy drugs and since I wasn't what could I say? I still take an interest in an anti inflammatory way of living, but the more I feel better, and the longer time that passes in which I feel better the more relaxed I feel I am getting with my diet. Maybe this also is OK. I am not sure. The total fat I once lost from my body (I swear I had a flat stomach for the first time in my entire life :) ) has crept up a bit. I went down to 8 and a half stone and now reckon I am more about 9-ish. It feels reasonable and I am trying not to be anxious about weight and body shape as well as health. Because eating and living has for so long now been about health that when I see fat on my body again I start to get those teenage-body-image-paranoia thoughts, the ones that I had thought long gone, the ones that occupy far too much head space and take you away from the real stuff.

So I make biscuits. And I damn well eat them too. Because in this moment I am fine, and the odd biscuit is pretty much OK too. And if it becomes not so I know I have the willpower and dedication to stop eating them. I did one, and can again. So roll out the cookies :)

Chocolate Crumble Cookies

ghee or virgin coconut oil - melted 1/2 cup
maple syrup - 3 glugs
coconut sugar - 1/4 cup

Mix well

Add a combined cup full of rice flour and ground almonds
Add cocoa - 3 tbsp ish

It should be a stiff dough type of mixture, if it's not add more flour/almonds until it is.

Flatten by the spoonful onto a paper lined tray and cook for ten-fifteen minutes in a medium hot oven. The ground almonds can be subbed with arrowroot flour/powder for a less firm biscuit. Or you can get rid of the cocoa and add lemon zest and use all arrowroot instead of the almonds for lemon cookies. They are all pretty yum.

When you can find beauty in a biscuit you know you have entered the realm of impermanence. There in nothing permanent about a biscuit. Not in this house. The ultimate reflection of life.

drowning, on a good day

My home and life feel very messy right now. No matter how much I sweep the floor or sleep, it's still the same. Mostly I just convince myself that there is nothing wrong with mess. That it's tidy and neat which are more problematic. But I'd be lying if I didn't say I much prefer the mental calm which comes hand in hand with clean. And peaceful. It's the inability to find the pause button whilst in that supernatural state. Which lead me on to thinking (grasping) at the faint thread of notion that it's not what happens in my daily life or how things are but how I choose to view it. That's what makes the calm. The peace. So. It's a very fine thread, often invisibly so. But at least my garden is blooming.



I have surrendered to the mess that is my daughter. She may wear what she pleases and do what she likes. I can no longer make excuses for her, or cajole her into conventionally pleasing clothing/mood/attitude/activity/food eating/hair brushing/washing). So I don't. It's actually quite nice, in a way. Less noise. Besides I am sure she is going to grow up to be someone who probably cares far too much about this sort of shit if what I see in every other teenager is anything to go by. Bird nest hair and only wearing tights all day is fine, really. Just don't kill me when you see these photos aged 15 (the worst age ever I reckon).







We seem to have been pretty arty here this week. Whilst I went out to feed and water the chickens Felix quickly sketched his dragon and painted it all in the space of about ten minutes pre-breakfast.





Sick of the bulky pointless thing taking up space in the airing cupboard (where else does one store this sort of thing?) I started painting the belly cast I made at about 38 wks pregnant with Esmé (although I am pretty sure it's going back in the very same cupboard). I am astonished at the then size of my breasts. Wow. They were massive. I'd forgotten that. Each one looks to be the size of my head. Or a curled up newborn. It's fascinatingly grotesque. In a way. I have placed it on the dining room window sill for ogling and marvelling over whilst we eat. I looked sadly at The Man who wrapped me in plaster of paris way back then - you must miss these huh? I asked him, prodding the nipples the size (and plaster hardness) of brazil nuts - he just looked at me oddly - hardly, I seem to remember you telling me they were out of bounds anyway..? Really? Who knows, can't remember, the pregnancy thing all befuddled and hyper sensitised me to everyone and everything. When I was pregnant with Felix I absent mindedly painted my sitting rooms walls alternate colours of green and orange. After the birth I looked round in pure disgust, it was vile. But my breasts? I reckon I am at least five sizes smaller now.



The girl who was in my belly took this photo (and look! Frickin dog is biting my pocket which contains a dried fish) so hence this being The Worst Photo in the World since we were all wobbling. But at least there is the size comparison, which I am rather Glad About. Big breasts are all very nice, but I am glad they are a thing of the past. I really shall spare you the naked ones my dh took of me during the making of this cast. But they too are fascinating and grotesque.



So sick of the chicken situation. Fox strikes again. Almost boring me now. Yawn, same old. On the plus side I shall not have to find chicken sitters when we go away in a few weeks. Even Felix the animal lover acted like I told him I was taking down a fence when I told him some were gone - oh? Well, they were not very nice ones anyway were they? He said. So that was two days ago and the only three the fox didn't take was the bastard cockerel who I totally loathe (I'll tell you why in a minute) and two old gimpy ones that don't lay. But then today one of the good layers limped back along the driveway and up to the chicken house where she began tucking into the food out in the run. Wow, well done choocky I cooed to her, you came back! Then she turned around. And I felt sick. How she was still standing up (and eating) was a mystery. About a third of her body was missing. She can't possibly live like this, but is. I vowed to multiple upset/disgusted children that if she was still living tomorrow I'd take her to The Vet. They were impressed. In the scheme of animal life cats and dogs get vet trips, anything lesser gets garlic in their drinking water and some good luck vibes. Least you think I am cruel I would have taken her today had I had a car, I don't though, by the misfortune of seeing a lone magpie. I am cursed by birds. I saw one whilst driving and craned my head trying to see another so as not to be cursed by the doom of a singleton. Whereupon I hit something (a curb probably) and got a puncture. Which just goes to show that seeing a lone magpie really does bring bad luck. And a cracked windscreen! Ok, so that wasn't bird related, but I am still without a car. If you still think I am cruel for not calling in the animal rescue helicopter (come on, there must be one) think on this: on seeing one of his women return to the flock, the cockerel ran up and mounted her, apparently not noticing half her body was missing. I screamed at him. Not the first time today either. He is such a bastard. I'd be half tempted to bestow him with intellect and cunning if I could not plainly see his head is no bigger than a walnut. Every single morning he takes the lengthy trip down from the hen house and stands directly, directly(!!) under my bedroom window and crows. Every three minutes from 4am onwards until I get up and throw a shoe or two at him. My wardrobe of fancy going-out shoes (that I never wear so no major loss) is diminishing fast, mainly because I lack good aim at 4.30am and they end up in the stream). But they do make him run off a bit, even 50 metres gets me a few more minutes sleep, that distance is just good enough that I can almost sleep properly again, even though I still hear him hooting triumphantly at me in my dreams.

I sort of want to tie him up and gift wrap him for the fox.



Esmé asked me to make red playdough for her. I did, she stabbed it a bit, said thanks and went back outside.



Together we invented Finger Print Cookies this arvo. They are gf, cf, flour free cookies made with ground almonds, arrowroot and coconut sugar. They were kind of nice. No one complained, but I doubt they'd win any prizes in a fancy show (mainly due to the finger prints jerked into the final look - not a hygienic sort of decoration). The girl read me out her remembered version of her Harry book while I did the bits she deemed too boring. Her version is miles funnier than the real one. She adds lines like - oh fine then, you win! When the dog submits to his bath.

We also made arrowroot, almond flour and lemon ones which were much yummier.



I seem to spend a lot of messy time picking up chewed and mangled things the puppy has been near. Today (so far): a wooden spoon, a newspaper, a lavender sachet (who even knew I had one?) Isaac's shoe, a sweeping brush, a pig's ear, a pair of socks, a potato, a sweeping brush....a playmobil man? It looked like one, we have hundreds so no great loss as I could see. Plus it kept the pup both quiet and occupied while I did something important (like emails or facebook scanning).

Felix and I have been playing so much Star Wars Top Trumps that I am forced to amuse myself by giving them all new and more interesting names. Count Dooku becomes Coconut Doughnut (I sort of squint and then give them the name that most resembles the one they already have with a foodie theme). Sigh. Who knew I'd ever spend so much time thinking/hearing/talking Star Wars? Still if he likes it it can't be that bad. Plus he's reading the cards (sort of) so I'll happily play every day if that's what it takes to get him literate. Hence the stoopid name game. He likes that bit though too so it's ok.



Had removed baskets of handy conkers, acorns and pine cones from the play kitchen as they were too tempting for the pup. Retrieved a basket of acorns from the study to find every single one nibbled through and the centre juicy nib removed. Disgusted and horrified I hoisted basket outdoors. There! Job done! That.... solves everything.... sort of. Don't go in that room much anyway so shall leave it to own devices (and handy cat - who I imagine brought the tiny rodent indoors in the first places, it enjoys that sort of thing). Except to mooch and loiter around bookshelves, remembering and selecting and discarding and trying to find slots for new finds, that room and it's contents are a mystery to me (snooker table, really?).



Felix took this photo. I am surprised I look like a normal sort of person.

Esmé then took another one, and I was doing a yoga move so I looked liked I had been assembled all wrong.

I took this one and you'd never know that my hair is a foot and a half long, would you? I look like I have none at all. Not a good look for me. But I'll put it here because you'll now see I really ought to wear make up, and it will be reminder to self when I cannot be bothered :) And probably fancy shoes too, if I had any.



Drying calendula flowers for oil making.



Could you resist this cute face staring up at you constantly? Not me. My doggie eats pigs ears and fish heads (and sticks) all day.





I try at get to the Thursday market. Just to watch. There's always a load of junk. But also fresh fish. I bought the dog an entire fresh mackerel all for herself. Chopped it in half watched the guts ooze out and fed it to her blissful self.









Felix found a 5p and Esmé ate an ice cream very happily.



The dog only gets a second or so of peace because she wants to live with it every minute.







My dentist totally annoyed me by fucking my mouth up this morning. He randomly removed an old amalgam filling I'd been umming and ahhing over whilst I was rendered speechless with a clamp holding jaw open. I'd like to have been prepared with a proper supplemental protocol (charcoal tablets, seaweed, chlorella etc). As it was I just held my breathe for the entire extraction (impressed?) and then swished my mouth out a million times. Then I went and bought the charcoal and took some seaweed stuff when I came home. Still, not sure if immune issues are helped by amalgam removal. I shall report back on how I get on this next week.

If I am still capable. I drown every day and then resurface, bobbing and treading water each morning anew. Some days I cling to my dh and would quite like to beg him to stay at home, because this life is often more... more everything than I had bargained for. But I don't, not through lack of pride (I have none, and have begged in my life for many things, many times - it's just what happens when you have children, starting whilst in labour before you even see them - please just fucking kill me!). I don't beg him because I'd be afraid he'd refuse and I like to imagine I still have the option of his availability available to me, on one of those worst days. This was not one. Mainly because it was sunny. Sun changes everything. Bare skin a shade darker, and clouded minds/hearts a touch lighter.

one minute in the life of Esmé

Kid you not. Not even a day in the life of, just a single minute of photos I took while sitting with her at the table. Nothing happened. It was just a regular minute. Exhausting? Um, yeah. Hilarious, yep. Lovable, that too. Thank god.












~~ I know, I know, I took a photo of her when she was upset (when prolly you are thinking why not just hug her? - she didn't want me too that was one reason, just one, another might be that she would have been beaming again by the time I reached her) but she wasn't really upset, not if you know her. Sometimes I think she'd be a great actress. But being a psycho comes so naturally I am not sure she'd be able to pull off other parts ~~