A glimpse of normality.

 

I’ve been a bit stuck for the last week and today, as the sun shone and dazzled and danced over this green land, I found myself released.

I like to think I have a faint graps on The Human Condition. I once had an awfully good shrink. I’ve read a bit of Jung and Adler and the very brilliant Dorothy Rowe. I try to practice sense and sanity each day as I would practice arpeggios. I have that red mare, my best professor, who teaches me valuable life lessons every single day.

And yet, there are the elephant traps, and there am I, falling into them.

The stuckness was to do with difficult emotions and a big family change and, humming away in the background, fretfulness over the manuscript which is still with the agent, still awaiting its marks out of ten, still not yet grown-up enough to be sold into the world as a book.

It manifested as a series of odd refusals. I would not follow the election campaign, even though I am a politics geek. I would not cook nice food, even though I love cooking and am quite good at it, but existed on ham sandwiches and quite often skipped lunch altogether. I would certainly not tidy the house or keep my office looking professional. I would not reply to that urgent email or this vital telephone message.

I was doing the bare minimum, and I hate doing the minimum.

Then, something shifted, and I was off to the races again. It’s more of a relief than I like to admit. There are still frets and scratches and murmuring worries in my mind, but I glimpse a small patch of normality. Today, I did my HorseBack work and had a long conversation with my friend The Marine. I went back to the other book I am writing, and set out on the sixth draft. Once that is done, I can send that one off too, and see if someone might like to buy it. I edited forty good pages and felt quite pleased. I had a glorious ride and did some useful work on the ground with the red mare and watched her learn something new, and teach me something new, because she teaches me every day. Tonight, I shall cook something proper for my supper. Tidying the office may still have to wait for another day, but now there is movement where there was paralysis and that feels like one great leap forward.

 

Today’s pictures:

This was the smiling face that greeted me as I arrived at HorseBack this morning. He is one of our regular veterans, and it’s always lovely to see him back with us, and to watch him reunite with dear Rodney, his old mucker:

Not my best pictures ever, because I’ve cut off her ears and there is a car tyre in the background. But you can see the dearness and the softness, and that’s all I care about: