What are days for?
To wake us up.
To put between the endless nights.
What are days for?
Days are where we live.
They flow and then they flow.
They come, they fade, they go and they go.
(Laurie Anderson)
A calm day, a pleasant, wonderful day. A day like an anchor. In the morning I faint after the shower and R runs up the stairs with a cup of strong tea. Based on this past week, whatever recovery I am expecting, it is going to be very slow. I spend large parts of the day in bed where I carefully select a podcast to listen to and soon fall into a floating dreamlike state, voices inside and outside of me fading through the open window and up into the sky. I like to think of it as meditation.
Eventually, some part of me wants to get up and, dutifully and carefully, I move around, almost sleep walking, deadheading flowers, rinsing the tea pot, hosing down the patio, changing towels, until I am breaking out into a sweat and my heart starts banging with an angry fist.
After my lunch time cup of milky coffee, I fall asleep for a while. Later, we watch Heart of a Dog, R leaning over the edge of the sofa holding my hands. In paradise, we often played our Laurie Anderson tape in the evening after sunset, sitting on the stairs with the dogs, chatting with passing neighbours, all the kids running around under the mango trees, singing O Superman.
Meanwhile, our daughter, our married grown up daughter is in Ireland, with her man and her friends, retracing our steps from the summer of 1979. They send little snaps from Connemara, smiling in the rain, running along windy beaches, like tourists in their tweed caps, cycling on Clare Island.
Turning time around(Lou Reed)
That is what love is
Turning time around
Yes, that is what love is
7 comments:
This reads like a dream, Sabine.
Take all the time you need.
Love and ache. And memories. Life happening gently. A good day, yes.
Reading this is like seeing a beautiful painting, hearing a new love song, finding a lost treasure in the sand. Sending you good wishes.
Sun's coming up, like a big bald head.
Dear Sabine, you and R and your daughter and her man and Laurie Anderson and Lou Reed and all of you blog friends who are partnered are my teachers, showing the way. Beautiful love song. It is never too late to turn time around. I'm learning about that in the past few months. Daring to trust. For the first time. The man who is dear to my heart is on a kidney transplant list. Love waits forever, for one and for all (Bob Dylan). Thank you so much for drawing my attention to "Heart of a Dog." I just put it on hold at the public library. Sending much love to you and R.
Do you know Larkin's pithy poem 'Days' which starts with the same line?
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