Month: November 2019

Categories
Adulthood Non-fiction Writing

Pause For Thought

While doing the dishes, a pause for thought,
Waiting for the kettle to boil, pause for thought.

While walking your four legged friends, a pause for thought,
Waiting for a train, pause for thought.

While brushing your teeth, a pause for thought,
When you’re in the shower, pause for thought.

While sat in a waiting room, a pause for thought,
When you’re eating your lunch, pause for thought.

During the adverts on TV, a pause for thought,
Waking up five minutes before the alarm, pause for thought.

While travelling or stuck in traffic, a pause for thought,
The moment before you fall asleep at night, pause for thought.

In this busy little life we lead we have to find perks indeed,
Noticing areas on the daily can help keep our sanity.

Whether it’s at home or work and even if only short,
There are always moments in this busy little life when we can pause,
Pause For Thought.

Categories
fiction Writing

Missing (Part 3)

I walk around the side through the conifer trees so that I can hide behind a trunk if anybody should step outside. This route also gives me the option to peer in through the bifold doors to see where they all are in the house. A thought passes through me as to why I am being so secretive when I have done nothing wrong but then if Mum knew of my intentions, she would never let it happen. Knowing whole heartedly that it is a bad decision to drive in the current mental state that I am in, I turn on the ignition, exit the driveway and bolt down the A64 heading towards home.

I have always loved this road and enjoyed many drives on it, the sun gleaming onto the windscreen, windows open, our hair sweeping in front of our faces. Sarah’s beaming grin lighting up the rainier days and her beauty outside and within brushing off onto my miserable frame. The laughter filling the car so that no trouble in the world could get in between us. Each moment with her is total bliss.

The road reminds me of holidays and how life with Sarah has changed my entire view on them. I used to live for getting away. For weeks where all my cares and worries vanished along with the mundaneness of and everyday working existence. Nowadays, my happiness comes when driving in the opposite direction down the road heading home. There is no happier place for me, and I no longer continuously wish to be away from it. Home is a good place and my life is a constant vacation whenever I am around Sarah.

My mind slips back into reality when I glance to the passenger seat to see yesterdays newspaper with our story on the front page. I look up, slam my foot on the breaks causing the car to screech to a halt upon seeing police cars by the edge of the road, signalling traffic to go around them in an orderly and safe fashion. My vision blurs as I look at other drivers throwing their bodies around in anger and frustration. Others merely pause to stare before zooming off into the distance. More than one emergency vehicle usually attracts viewers from the prying public, but four flashing police cars makes even the most uninterested passer by glare over their shoulder.

I slowly approach the scene and begin to veer round following the cones, but I swiftly ignore the police signals after seeing what it is that they have found.

Categories
Adulthood Non-fiction Observations Review

Angels

Since dipping in and out of Lorna Byrne’s book, Angels in my Hair, I can say that I believe in angels. Think I’m daft? Hear me out.

My Grandad once said that: “all the good things you do in the world for other people are rewarded. Perhaps you don’t recognise the rewards because they do not come in material benefits; it might be a good feeling or the experience of just having a day when everything is going your way.” This is a quote that I cling on to and one that perfectly portrays my version of angels.

In Byrne’s book she describes various situations that could have ended horrifically yet didn’t due to something stopping the worse case scenario as if by chance. A girl doesn’t go out into the road to save her getting hit by the car; angels can be seen when Lorna goes on a shopping trip to Moore Street and her mother is told of a rotten apple within the ones she was about to buy; the angel Elijah even warns Lorna about her friend Joe’s impending disease.

Of course, these could all simply be luck playing its way into the lives of these fortunate few, however, and I strongly believe, if you think of it as angels preventing awful things happening, angels watching over us all constantly on the lookout, then life suddenly becomes that bit more magical.

I frequently drive up to traffic lights that instantly turn green (especially when I am in a rush) and look above briefly to thank the angels. The other day a coat was on sale, one left and in my size, I absolutely love it and each time I wear it I give thanks to the angels. While walking home alone in the dark and feeling (unnecessarily scared) I feel safer knowing that the angels are all around. When I get stressed and angry I take a moment to quietly ask the angels for strength to be a good person.

Too often in life we focus on the negative. If we are having a bad day then every tiny thing that goes wrong is the most awful thing in the world, angering us beyond measure. Yet if we have the same attitude to good things, as small as they may be, it can have a huge impact on our mood. By viewing these nuggets of goodness as angels being around, brings me more happiness and strength each day while muddling through life.

Mock me if you wish and it is a very personal belief (a very personal version of what to others might differ but still be angels) but if you feel inclined to learn more or would like an incredibly interesting read, certainly get your hands on Lorna Byrne’s book, it’s insightful and warming in every way.

Categories
fiction Writing

Missing (Part 2)

My breathing is drastically increasing in pace, but I won’t stop until I find her. Each time the wind blows I jump as if someone is behind me or in case I miss a vital clue. The sounds of the birds and other creatures in nature makes me also second guess whether I am missing something that will lead me to her.

‘Why did she leave? Why did she ever go out on her own? Why?’ I shout this out loudly in case somebody can hear me and might be able to help. Even if they can’t I long for a companion, someone to be a physical comfort through my search. Simply to be there.

I find a large stick the size that our Cocker Spaniel, Buster, usually chooses whenever we are on a longer dog walk. His size is always disproportionate to the stick he decides to carry with him and no matter how many people he nearly knocks over with it, there is no way he will let us take it off him. He growls as if in danger when Sarah or I attempt to remove the wooden trunk from his mouth, so we always give up and let him have his own way, as with most other things.

I use the stick to move the trees and bushes away so that I can clearly view what lays underneath. I don’t know why I am choosing to do this, but I feel it is more productive than doing nothing at all. I realise I am jumping to conclusions or pre-empting an awful discovery by choosing to search this way, but I am hopeless in despair, so I feel that I have no other choice.

After a while of being away from the house I notice that I have forgotten my phone or any form of time telling device, so I have no way of knowing how long I have been gone. The children must be wondering where I have got to and Mum must be worrying silly about my whereabouts or where my anger and frustration has led me. She knows from experience how bad I can get sometimes. She must have so many questions running through her head about the real story of what happened to Sarah. She always second guesses me but this time I have told her the whole truth. All I know of it anyway.

Suddenly, I get a sense within me like a dog would in a police search unit and run back to Mum’s to get into my car. Adrenaline kicks in giving me the energy to take on the distance from the forest to the house. I run off-pieced to get to the fields quicker, cutting my leg on thorn bushes and obtaining numerous nettle stings in the process. I run through the fields, ignoring the clearly marked public footpaths and instead trample through the carefully planted crop, my nose starting to run as soon as I reach the bright yellow field full of rapeseed. Usually I wouldn’t be able to cope with the allergies but the panic increases with my desperation to get to the car, so knowing that this field is the next from home allows me to continue. I stop at the edge of Mum’s garden to catch my breath and decide how to enter so that nobody will notice me taking the car or notice me at all in fact. I don’t wish to be seen, I just want to get to her and fast.

Categories
Adulthood Non-fiction Observations

I read because…

I read because I’m inspired

I read because I learn from it

I read because it gives me ideas

I read to relax

I read because it takes me to good places

I read because I love it

I read because it helps me sleep

I read because I slow down

I read because it shuts my head off

I read because I usually have a dog on my lap

I read because of imagination

I read because of invented worlds

I read because I want to know things

I read because it’s good for me

I read because I am lucky to be able to

I read for enjoyment

Categories
fiction Writing

Missing (Part 1)

My face is numb, but I can still feel it. It is a weird sensation as if my cheekbones have turned to jelly and the feeling is slowly evaporating never to return, but in the present moment the physical awareness remains. The expression that I have been holding for the past fortnight won’t leave and it is paining me knowing this but there is nothing I can do about it. The exhaustion throughout my body remains too and no matter how much I try to relax, my mind doesn’t allow for any form of recuperation.

‘Why don’t you get some rest,’ Mum says affectionately while she tries to remain normal and feed the children their favourite – spaghetti hoops on toast.

Though I know she means well, it is the last thing I wish to hear because I cannot rest until we find her.

‘I just can’t.’ I snap at her not meaning to and leave, heading into the unknown.

I walk out of Mum’s patio doors which lead into her huge garden. Her garden has been an ongoing project for as much of my life as I can remember. It has been so carefully designed at an extortionate price by a professional to look as wild and uncared for as it does, and my feet speed up into an almost run as I traipse through. Her garden backs on to an expanse of fields. Wide open space with nothing else around until the forest, but that is over a mile in the distance so I don’t know whether I will get that far.

Running through this landscape gives me a total sense of freedom and new energy that I haven’t experienced for almost a month and it is something that cannot be explained in words. I feel as if I can fly and the sweet smell of Mum’s garden resonates in my nostrils as I proceed to make the distance to the forest. This is also a new thing that I am noticing because smells are certainly something that have vanished during this dark time. Noticing the scent of the Hydroniums and Honeysuckle lingering in my memory bank pleases me but doesn’t remove my hurt.

On reaching the forest a wave of panic that I am so familiar with now comes over me again. It swarms my body as if a snake wrapping itself tightly around my frame with intention to kill. All the new energy that I had whilst I was pacing through the fields has instantly disappeared. My sense of freedom too has washed away into the air and I am left feeling that all too intimate sensation of horror that has been a permanent fixture inside me lately.

I begin searching frantically in the bushes, even looking high up into the trees.

‘Sarah!’ I scream in pure desperation hoping, naively, that she will pop out from behind a large tree trunk and shout ‘Hello!’ as if all of this has been some sort of sick joke.

Categories
fiction Stories Writing

Descriptive fiction

Thankfully the sun was shining, already brightening my mood for the day and I had just started a new book on recommendation by Eileen who I can always rely on when it comes to good reads. It was one that she had found in a charity shop which is where she finds a lot of her suggestions if they don’t come from the book club that she irregularly attends and it was by an author that she loves which is usually how she picks out the good ones. She is a very loyal reader and once she finds an author that she likes she reads every book written by them until the list has been completely exhausted.

This one was complex from the start and had me gripped instantly. I love books that have that effect and I knew that I wouldn’t be able to put it down until my eyes began to droop with tiredness later that evening. The protagonist had experienced a death of someone close to her, a relative I felt, though it wasn’t clear who had died. She was sorting through the will while trying to sort out the house with a useless brother and intrusive friends to make matters worse. Three chapters in, she had discovered so much about her life that she never knew, and each chapter ended on a cliff-hanger forcing my addiction to the story line to continue.

I was so engrossed in the novel that I hadn’t noticed Jack set up his chair beside me with his iPad and headphones in. He must be playing a game, I thought to myself, but didn’t start to ask him because we were both content in our own worlds but sharing a happy space in our garden, together.

The sky looked like one in a perfect world, clear blue with just a few fluffy white clouds dotted about, perfectly shaped. The breeze came at intervals that provided just enough cool air but never too much that we had to get jackets on, and the warmth continued to make our skin smile. The birds seemed to be enjoying themselves with subtle sounds coming from the trees but apart from that everything was still.

The first smells of freshly mowed lawn came over the fence as our neighbours started to perform their initial garden tidy up of the year and the sounds of the lawnmower and laughter from their children hinted strongly that summer was well on its way. As I started to think that the length of the last warm period on my skin was considerably longer than the last, I looked up to see that most of the clouds had vanished and the sun shone down on its own.

‘Here, you two. Put some cream on,’ Eileen shouted from the kitchen, a tea towel in her hand and clearly emptying the dishwasher while listening to Randy Travis on the stereo.

I had attempted to introduce her into the world of Spotify, claiming that it would save her a lot of money, time and space on her shelves, but she disregarded my efforts and instead wanted to keep her old habits alive.

I lay in silence beside my brother reading my book and my attention only became slightly interrupted when passers by walking their dogs and their children were in loud conversation that interested my brain. The topics were never that interesting at all and they were talking about people I didn’t know but I felt it was natural for a girls brain to focus on any form of gossip, whether it involved me or not.