A reflection

They say a week is a long time in politics, this of course has been shown beyond any doubt in the events that have unfolded recently in a country I used to call home. But what of a year?

I've been reflecting a lot over the last few days, I do that, but especially at this time of year as it's an easy time to remember.

Of course looking back both the painful and good memories come flooding in, once again I've been glad I live alone so nobody else has to witness the mess. But it suddenly occurred to me; just what was I doing in the less memorable years? So I looked, rather inevitably I took advantage of Google photos and it turns out I could track back at least to 2010 to see exactly where I was on this day.

As I looked at the photos I realised something, the me of that day had no idea what the hell was coming next...

2010: London Zoo

Ah yes. At this point in time I'd scurried off to London to work as ends needed to meet and food needed to be on the table, it was a difficult time. I do remember that I was walking on eggshells, carefully following the line that separated one argument from another. But at this point I had no clue, no idea that it would be but a few short months before being rather unceremoniously informed that my marriage had reached the end of the road. It was, quite simply a path that I couldn't see. And yet with hindsight it was so obvious.



2011: The Crown, Victoria Park

When Monty met Bizzle. Obviously I was only there as Monty's chaperone, I know Bizzle was a bad bear likely to lead him astray. By now the events outline above had not particularly neatly unfolded and I was in a strange place. And I don't mean Barnes, though that was, of course, where I was living at the time.

Looking back through the previous months there were huge gaps which rather reflected the darkness.

I know I had plans, though I know the unravelling that was going on made them all singularly difficult, which is probably why I didn't see that a year later...



2012: Limehouse Cut

Rather unexpectedly I found myself sharing a flat with my best friend and Contrary Towers was born. We'd been there since March, which rather proves the point of not seeing what was coming next. And at the time I had no idea I would be there for the next 3+ years. Things were moving, changing, morphing. And more importantly in 2012 things were stabilising. After years, oh so many years, of being what others expected me to be, to do my duty, to conform, I became... Me.

Selfish, single minded, me.

At 45, I finally, well, nearly, got to do what I wanted to do.

Bitch.



2013: Limehouse Cut, again.

By All Hallows Eve 2013 I'd acquired a wand, given by the daft sod who would become my flatmate in 2016, but I didn't know that then. In fact, thinking about it, I was quite pissed off with him at the time, though not for the wand. I can't really think what it was all about. Not to worry.

Though looking at the picture now I'm wondering where the hell my boobs went.

What I do remember was I was home alone, missy was away somewhere or other and, as a result, she missed the fireworks that were either for an early Diwali or a very early Guy Fawkes. I didn't expect them. I was sitting on our balcony, a glass of wine in hand, when the first firework exploded. I put it down to kids. However, after about 20 minutes I decided that maybe it was actually organised...

I had no idea that the next year I would actually be in...



2014: Norfolk

Eh? To be fair it was half-term and was really trying to make an effort, contrary to what I imagine my ex would have been said and, almost certainly, is still saying, even though things aren't exactly being made simple. So I behaved. And carved a pumpkin. It must be said, these are a lot easier to carve than the turnips I used to do when I was young.

As memories go this was a bit of a non-time. This is almost certainly a bad thing as I'm really good at blanking that kind of nonsense. I just wanted to go home. I wasn't looking forward to the next All Hallows Eve, but then I didn't know that the next one would be...



2015: She, Soho

Well this beat being at home. I'd been working that day, things to finish, and afterwards I popped in to She for a cheeky cocktail before heading home, as you do. I can't remember exactly why I agreed to the whiskers and moustache, but it seemed like a really good idea at the time.

That night though, in context, felt like the end of an era, the last madness before a coming storm.

And I definitely didn't expect that the next year I would be in...

2016: New York

And then the storm hit. Or didn't.

Have you seem "The Crown" on Netflix? In series 1, episode 2, you see the young Elizabeth blissfully off on her Commonwealth Tour unaware that her father had died and her life had changed.

That was me, sort of. Mine had changed a few days earlier, on the 28th, when, unexpectedly, my partner died. Because he'd previously done disappearing acts I put not having replies down to that. I dutifully wrote messages, gave updates and said goodnight to somebody who didn't make it to the end of play on the Friday. And I had no idea. I took missy to the airport as she headed home, I packed, I faffed, I messaged, I boarded a plane and I flew to New York. It was another couple of days before I was tracked down and contacted.

I fell apart.

Yet in the same light that I had no idea I would be there, I had no idea on this day in 2016 that all of the plans I'd made, we'd made, had evaporated. Gone. No more.

What makes it worse, in hindsight, is that the friend that I was with then, well, she is no longer talking to me. And I have no idea why, nor would I get a reply if I asked. The kids apparently call this "ghosting". I can't begin to tell you how much this hurts.

However, what I can tell you is that I sat on that plane heading to JFK I really had no idea a year later I would be in...



2017: Brighton

Well, Woodingdean, just outside Brighton. A lovely private hospital having some major corrective surgery to fix a long standing problem. Go me! That evening I feasted on not very much and jelly whilst being completely horizontal and not allowed to move. It has to be said, my costume looked before authentic and scary.

I didn't think much about what would come in 2018 as to be honest I was falling asleep every three minutes, not making much sense and being even more spaced out than normal.

There was no wine that evening. Mind you, a mixture of general anaesthetic and morphine is guaranteed to make you a party animal! Sort of.

I can say though that this was a good reason why I had no idea that the next year I would be in...

2018: Epping Upland

Eh? I really shouldn't have been quite so doped up the year before, maybe I would have been able to predict me becoming so exasperated with London life that I moved out to a stupidly remote place to live mostly alone in an old farmworkers cottage. Definitely not Limehouse Marina. Oh, just realised, in 2016 and 2017, whilst I lived by Limehouse Marina I was never there on the evening of the 31st.

Whilst it had been a tricky year, a really tricky year, I was happy enough with the situation. I know it wasn't to everybody's taste, but I had emotional wounds to heal and it worked for me. In fact it was working so much that I'd checked with the agent to ensure that I'd be able to renew for another year, plans had been formed.

So once again, I had no clue that with a swift change of circumstance, I would find myself on this All Hallows Eve on...



2019: Sark

Sark. It's been 225 days since I moved here.


And yet; going back to my opening line, my feelings could have been very different this evening. Today was supposed to be the big day, according to the dogma driven politicians, that the UK would leave the EU. Unlike the politicians though, when I make an actual plan, I stick with it, I was determined to leave the UK before it left; of course the 29th of March came, went and the band played on.

Unlike the politicians I've learned that you can't predict the future, you can't state with certainty that something will happen. You can't stake your reputation on the unknown.

And I'm now sure I have no idea where I will be, or what I'll be doing on the 31st of October 2020.

Que sera, sera.

Watergate - an analogy

Not a bath.

If you've been following me on Twitter, you're probably aware of my ongoing problem with water. Or a lack thereof. The problem is fairly simple, my water comes from a well, though this in itself was contentious, the well fills from the ground water and an *electric pump draws the water up, pressurises a tank to 3.5 bar and is then delivered through the house by pipes.

A modern miracle.

The contentious part is that many people on the island believed that I am on a borehole, as most now are. But I'm not. To settle this, the lovely Aunty Helen called her brother to ask about it as he'd done the renovation work when her aunt and uncle lived here. Sure enough he confirmed that this work was done before the borehole that feeds other buildings in Mon Plaisir was sunk. In fact, it was done before the other buildings had been built.

During the conversation she pointed out, quite rightly, that originally there would have been no running water and it would have all been drawn by hand-pump from the well.

Ah, the good old days.

And that got me thinking. Surely running water is like the European Single Market.

Why? Well, as with the Single Market, and as hailed by brexiteers everywhere, we used to get on without it just fine. We can easily return to those times and there will be blue skies, girls in pinafore dresses, picnics and lashings of ginger beer.

Not to mention the sparkly unicorns.

The problem is this. Since the conversion the nature of the infrastructure changed.

A new fangled electric pump was installed along with pipes and taps to give just-in-time delivery. No more going out to the hand-pump, pail in hand, as the wind whistled by at 50mph with horizontal rain. A flushing toilet was installed, no need for an outhouse or for a chamber pot to relieve those middle of the night calls of nature. And a shower, what bliss, heated by an oil boiler, stored in a tank and delivered under pressure to make you clean and refreshed for the day ahead, those glorious bygone days of fetching the tin bath, boiling water on the range and spending a quick moment in an inch of lukewarm water.

Once a week whether you needed to or not.

Even the heating changed, instead of fires in each room a move could be made to a new fangled system, timer and thermostat controlled to ensure a house was cosy whenever you wanted it. Bliss.

Or at least it would be bliss so long as the frictionless movement of water from the well to the house was maintained.

Firemen showing me their hose...

And this is what has happened in the UK with the European Single Market, the infrastructure changed, the supply lines aligned with great efficiency to provide a seamless means of getting stuff from A to B when you wanted it without effort.

But if you take that away... Things break. My actual Wexit.

Suddenly the toilet no longer flushes, the shower doesn't work, the washing machine stands idle. I have neither a tin bath nor a tub and mangle to replace what I've lost, but even if I did I would have to schlep down the lane carrying endless buckets of water to boil very slowly in a range of pots and kettles to clean with. And my dishes are piling up.

Of course, I adapted, you have to, as the UK will adapt. But I can promise you that having to stroll across the island to the public loos when you wish to do more than spend a penny, is not pleasant in a storm. Neither is waltzing down that muddy lane with jugs for water to cook with. Or buying bottled water at a premium.

Fortunately I have plenty of wet wipes to keep myself clean. Ish. If I had a bath I could of course have taken a leaf out of the 1950s handbook and boiled water for that luxuriating one inch soak. But I don't.

It's a good job I live alone.

The analogy goes further. As a deal is struck to bring water back in to the system you will find things have changed. Dumping 600 gallons of water in to a few hundred year old well using a firehose is guaranteed to stir up the mud and sediment that lurks 28' below the surface. This isn't good.

So whilst some services return, I can flush the loo, the washing machine remains idle, the cooking water comes from down the lane, the shower is unused, dishes are unwashed and drinking water comes in a bottle. Over time the water settles and bit by bit I can use more of it. But the seamless integration that existed before Wexit is a distant memory. And all the while I'm aware that it's a matter of time before the water stops again.

Of course I'm hoping that I will find things better under the WTO (Well Turned Off) rules as a deal is forged with the borehole outside Mon Plaisir Stores. But even that is filled with uncertainty as I don't know when it might happen.

Island life.

* also an issue