Talking To Myself In November

Typing badly due to having (accidentally) given my thumb a lid.

Have taken the plaster off now for air to assist healing.

Earlier, with wound protected (under a plaster, inside a latex glove) I drove out to Paddock Garden (our land - the name has stuck) to plant strawberries and a fern, and scatter evening primrose seeds.

The sky was like grey inks painted on wet paper; leaves spun fire colours from branch to ground. 

This injury is inconvenient, annoying, and on my mind, so I pondered wounds as I drove: I thought of:

How I have used stoic principles to survive circumstances with grace and learning, which has served me well. (A stoic would say this, of course.)

How also I had become so accustomed to nobly suffering from secret wounds, sometimes still it is hard to comprehend how to live without hurt.

Hurt is comfortable. Hurt is a habit. Hurt is reflective and meaningful.

Pain can be a blast of life.

You (you being me, I’m talking to myself) need to stop, to assess.

To recall that happiness is part of life too, and every bit as deep or shallow as sadness; that levels of everything fluctuate, including your understanding, your patience, your carefulness with a kitchen knife. 

When the strawberries, the fern, and the seedpods were all where they should be, me and my injuries wheeled the barrow back to the old stable. Rain faded in and out. We lay back on the bare board of the sofa bed listening to the random beat, to the autumn leaves rustle as a light wind swayed each tree, to the jaybirds squawk with admirable confidence.

We sat up happy; me, my injuries, my wandering thoughts; looking out at the orange-gold swathes under silvery drizzle, and the crass happy birds hustling for acorns.