I tend to do this... Thanks to my job and an annoyingly accommodating body clock, I tend not to get to sleep till the wee small hours and sometimes the old brain starts to tick over and I start reminiscing, evaluating, looking back, wondering what I'm doing here, what I've achieved, why I should be happy with who I am...
Last July we had our first family holiday. It was only a week in Yorkshire, but after the 18 months that preceded it, it may as well have been a yearlong round-the-world cruise. Up until then I'd had four days' holiday in ten years. The others had never had a holiday - not even Charlie.
It was cold and wet for most of the week. We had only three hours on the beach, the day after we arrived. When we visited the nearest big town, it rained so much it took a whole bottle of gas to dry us and our clothes off that night. Travel, food and entertainment were expensive and the distances we had to travel with a bulky pushchair were not to be believed.
It was a wonderful holiday! The caravan was spacious, dry, warm and comfortable. We made friends with the people in the next caravan and Allison spent three solid days playing with them, crying when they left to go home. We had one of the most wonderful meals we've ever eaten in an old POW camp that had been made into a Museum. For the first time in a year, we went the whole week without an argument. The kids didn't sleep too well but that was OK because it gave us an excuse to go for a moonlit walk along the clifftops, marvelling in the sights and sounds of the dark sea and beach far below.
Our daughters adored the beach, loved seeing new towns and open fields and the SEA - my god the sea! Majestic storm-whipped breakers smashing against the pier and the seafront...Gulls shrieking into the bracing wind...Sitting staring out across the North Sea sharing freshy cooked doughnuts and crab sandwiches! I felt alive, oh so thoroughly 100% awake and alive!
I've always loved roughing it, the simple life, making do with whatever's at hand. When I met Charlie I was living in a typical bachelor flat - my bed was a mattress I'd found outside in pristine condition the night I'd moved in (to this day I call it my futon), I had no cooker, just a microwave and a tiny electric oven, no fridge either. I kept things cold in a sinkful of water in the bathroom. My kitchen cupboards were full of tins, flavoured rice packets, 20p noodles and herbs and spices. My bedroom drawers were empty but the floor was full. In the summer I'd leave the balcony door open for weeks on end, I'd take the bedroom door off its hinges and hang a blanket over the doorway just to get air into the room. I never hung curtains of any description. That was me. If any home ever shouted louder of the mindset of its owner, I never knew about it.
And do you know what? Despite the squalor, the bare plaster walls covered in posters, the partially carpetted floor, the threadbare sofas, everyone who walked in commented on how comfortable and at-home they felt there. I've rarely had a better complement. That's me all over - comfortable...
Well, the holiday has left me with a constant yearning. Right now I know it would take half an hour to pack my things, find a tent and a sleeping bag, and take off. I've even planned how I could live through at least two weeks (all the time I'd need to set up in another town) with not much more than £100 on me. I think its only the fact that all my stuff is close to hand that makes living in a big city tolerable. I know that stopgap, that pressure release valve is readily accessible.
Every time I walk to the local shops, I wish I was tramping throught row after row of caravans, retracing the route to the campsite shop. Every time I see the sea my heart aches to smell the salt air. In the winter, the seagulls come inland, so I'm regularly faced with one of the most evocative seaside sounds.
But I have responsibilities. A family to raise, a partner to heal, a job to do, bills to pay and futures to map out. I have plans. I know what I want for the next few years. I know what I'm aiming at.
I'll be going to see the sea again soon. A visitor for now. Not forever. One day this Hedgewitch will have water for a neighbour. Lots of it.
Ramble over, go to bed. Dream and be glad you're you.
