Albatross - 800, 1, and 6…

The Albatross, Mervyn Peake's illustration for the Rhyme of the Ancient Mariner by Coleridge. There's a certain harmony with it, something I relate to.

I think in theme terms I may have somewhat lost my way with my blog, or maybe I was just fooling myself for a while, pretending that it was a surreal, multi-layered, enigmatic journey to a destination that even I wasn't sure of.

My albatross maybe, or then again maybe not at all, not at all.

A bit of doodling, some creative writing, things that popped into my mind for no reason, my take on things, an opportunity to explore, a game I was playing with myself and anyone else that was brave or misguided enough to read.

Well, here I am some 800 posts later and it turns out it's just my odd, old ramblings after all as I try to say something when I’m not sure that I really have much to say. An albatross if ever there was one to shoot down from the sky.

I’ve never said much about the darkness of this, but it was a year to the day last Saturday that Misty was killed and I got that call from Gaynor in Wales. An hysterical, sobbing, hard to understand call that took me minutes to interpret and will take me forever to fully realise the meaning of.

Only a year? I could have sworn it was longer.

Anyway, here are the details - well some of then, the ones that are laser etched onto my mind. I remember pulling in at the cottage, leaping out of the car, and looking down into the carrier bag laid carefully on the concrete by the back door. There she was, gently enclosed, wrapped in white plastic, a cold trickle of dried blood running from her nose, fur still wet with rain and almost alive apart from the total lack of movement.

It was torrential that day and I drove so recklessly to get there as fast as I could. I was lucky to have stayed on the road, I skidded twice.

It wasn’t Misty in there though, just the furry thing that she moved around in.

Holly had put her in that bag to keep the rain off, and it was Holly who lifted her out of the road and brought her home that last time - such a very brave thing to do.

And we walked up the Lane to the farm, a procession of four, heads down in the pouring rain that masked our tears. Misty lay lightly across my outstretched arms in a Tesco shroud as we trudged our grey way up to the farm that she had sprung from.

And Geronwy, ever practical, digging the grave for me to gently place her into the dark. I had to get down on my knees to do it and my trousers, caked in mud, never did feel clean again despite all the washing.

And afterwards we placed a paving slab over her remains to mark the spot and keep away the foxes and trudged our grey way home in silence.

And a year, it can’t be, can it?

And yesterday was the six months anniversary of my finishing work, a short six months, the time flying, without me seeming to achieve very much. Half of that same year since Misty’s death, a long year and a short six months, how can that be I wonder?

Just how does time work?

The time between events seems to speed and slow dependent on something other than time, driven or slowed by something else altogether. Misty seems to have been dead for years, but I only left my job a few weeks ago. The first tentative post of What a Wonderful Life seems only a short while back, but here I am stumbling along posting my eight hundred and first bit of nothing and nonsense.

Yes nonsense - because it really makes no sense this time-passing-linked-to-event rather than the ticking of a clock or the Earth spinning around the Sun. Perhaps it’s about loss or joy, pain or relief, or maybe a short circuit in the electrical wiring of our brains – but it really makes no sense.

And sometimes I feel I’m in my open boat, cast upon the sea, delirious through thirst, made mad by the sun, watching the Albatross of my blog circling high above me.

Eight hundred, one, and six, but really a start, an end, and a whole new kettle of fish.

This Albatross. I wonder if my back is strong enough?