Making light of it all...

Short days and dull skies. Lack of light. 

I feared that central London life would cloud my spirit in damp grey, begrime my thoughts, stir the black dog into mindless circling in the fog. 

I thought I’d ache for golden sun. 

I needn’t have. Our little attic cave has none of that.

What it DOES have, is so many goddamned  sources of artificial light that I swear the lux levels are leaking through my eyelids and infiltrating my dreams. 

The smoke detectors have blinking green lights.

The security panel has a glowing red light.

And in what can only be considered every disco-divas dream, the stair lights change colours. I shit you not.

Look!

I boogie my flat arse up and down to those babies most every night and I'm here to tell you they don't stop till I've had enough.

Magic motion-activated LED strips illuminate the wardrobe as the doors open. Ever so convenient and niftily, they also turn themselves off after a wee-while if the dressee has neglected to close said wardrobe.

Slight hiccup with that the other night though. 

I don't know about you, but I favour the internal thermostat control method employed by 99.9% of menopausal women at night and stick one foot out from beneath the covers whenever I  need to cool down.

Yep. The bedroom, which, I might add, has four downlights and two wall-sconces all operated by two-way switches both at the doorway and beside the bed... not MY side of the bed mind you...HIS side of the bed... but anyway, the bedroom is so small that my preferred method of heat-relief caused a spontaneous party in the wardrobe. 

HE was not amused.

But to be fair, I think it was probably my giggling that pissed him off.  

The bathroom mirror boasts a touch-operated wrinkle-enhancing frame, able to be switched from startling white-light apparently designed to reveal every sun-spot and enlarged pore, to a gentle soft glow, just low enough to fool a 58-year-old woman into thinking she's done a pretty good job of concealing every sun-spot and enlarged pore with her deftly applied tinted moisturiser.

Possibly because the it's both windowless and about the same size as the wardrobe, the bathroom also has a motion-activated light. Meaning, of course, that if one needs to have anything more than a quick whizz, one will soon find oneself pants-down in the dark, at which point it becomes necessary to flail one's arms about in a most unlady-like manner to remedy the situation.

Lack of light is most certainly not a problem up here in the attic cave.

Up here, where The Bee Gees live on.

A Teaspoon of Dragon

I fell into a hole.

Which is not to say that I’ve been buried.

Or living under a rock.

More that I’ve sort of been making my way clumsily through summer, stubbing my toes on awkwardly rocky conversations and bruising myself mightily by thudding into me-made walls and barriers as I try to navigate the generally normal social interactions that dominate the holiday period... especially when you live in a big-mother of a house by the beach like I do.

The universe has been trying to throw me a rope to haul myself out. A human rope. So maybe it was more of a life-sized 3D paper doll chain than a rope. I think I saw it there. I did try not to ignore it. But I lacked the courage to grasp it. In truth, I was frightened I might tear it by tugging too desperately, damage its integrity by dangling my substantial frame from its fragile fabric.

Luckily for me, there was magic about : the sort of magic Roald Dahl knew how to find, and make, and spread.

It all started when a little dragon rode a pewter friendship spoon all the way from the other side of the world to land in a sheltered corner of my dining room. He settled happily there amidst other small treasures that remind me of the beauty and wonder outside my hole. And he quietly set about reminding me of something very important.

Never underestimate the power of a dragon.

Soon after his arrival, week by week, message by message, visit by visit began a parade from my past. People I thought lost to me came calling. Friends from earlier times and other places dropped by bringing memories and smiles, champagne and deliciously gooey French cheeses to share.

The evil bitch at the bottom of the hole, the one who holds fast to my ankles and laughs at my attempts to free myself, filled my head with her malicious whispers:   

these people knew you when you were someone worth knowing… you used to be successful… what are you now?

she remembers you as a strong competent woman… you used to be worthy of her respect… what happened?

he hasn’t aged a bit: can’t say the same for you… look at yourself…be ashamed... be embarrassed

But the small dragon was there. Tangible. Textured with truths. Weighted with veracity.

These people had sought me out.  All of them had thought of me, for whatever reason, and followed that thought with action. They had come to spend time with me. Not the person I used to be. Not the person I think I should be. Not even the person the whispering bitch wants me to be. Just me.

Y Ddraig Goch is his name: the Red Dragon of Wales. To me, he will forever be Y Ddraig Goch: Slayer of the Whispers. 

It wasn't a rope I needed, or a chain of hands to drag me out of my hole, it was the wings of a small dragon.