WEEK 7 - 13 February 2022
I eventually locate the house at the tip of Cockerham Sands, after scraping past a farmer’s truck on an endless narrow track curving between sodden fields complete with lakes reflecting a bruised sky. Above the whipping windscreen wipers, Sascha loudly complains in the cat-carrier behind my seat. Madam SatNav has given up, after bossily sending me down a track with no passing points, where a farmer lurched past in his brimming truck and I expected Death by Manure, instead of planned chocolate.
The cat-fosterer who is courageously taking on Sascha before she kills our cats, tells me on the phone that he can see me and to keep driving. I do and become becalmed on a thin rise before a farm. A splendidly clear sign states: NO ENTRY! PRIVATE PROPERTE! NO TURNINK! The last is a worry. I reverse painfully between ditches for aeons, then see a man running towards the car. He’s framed against a dramatic backdrop of skeletal trees wind-bent, arthritically, in the same direction. [Think BFI, 1950.] Turns out he’s the nice fosterer-chap; he lives in a cottage next to the farmer’s sign. ‘I suppose it is a bit off-putting,’ he muses.
I enjoyed meeting Storm Eunice, but her brother Dudley trailing crossly behind isn’t much fun. Jonathan moved into the quiet back room last night, his nerves shot by the racket out front. I did run Sellotape along the keening double-glazing in our bedroom, but the poor man flinched at new booming noises from above, under the eaves. I was woken in the night by Jonathan shouting, ‘Not the roof!’ in his sleep.
A painful lump has been annoying my right foot for months. It’s come to a head – the issue, not the lump – as I can no longer wear pretty shoes! Limped to a foot consultant; it must be worse than working in a shoe-shop, but the man’s surprisingly cheerful. Perhaps his sense of smell has atrophied. Turns out my Lump is Arthritis, so ageing. I’ll tell everyone it’s a sports sprain.
The same day, Jonathan and I stop for a delicious meal at the Cartford Arms at Great Eccleston and take a coastal ride on Blackpool trams. Despite the cold, the sun comes out to play, beaming gold above us. Marvellous! I let Jonathan drive my car home; it gets exhausting banging my (non-arthritic) brake-foot on the floor on the M6.
Storm Flatulence has gate-crashed now – or is it Fenella? Who thinks up these names? It’s the third Heathcliff episode in Morecambe in a week, aka Storm Force 14. We normally chortle at the breezes Southerners call gales. Mind you, no-one has a face left up here, but perhaps heads just get blown back to front.
Good things always come in threes – our entire Victorian terrace, built on sand, is being blown back from the sea not into it – but I do worry that it’ll become fours in this age of More is More. I still recall being a greedy six-year-old (not a lot changes) and firmly thwarted by my Nan. ‘Less is more’, she said, thriftily doling out her delicious treacle pudding and lump-free custard. At school dinners, us kids held the custard jug upside-down over our heads for dares. [The skin held firm.]
More excitement! In two days’ time we will all experience a palindrome. No, it’s not a pandemic. If you’re still awake at 22:02 on 22.02.2022 you’ll see a Unicorn or Boris, depending on whether you’re a glass half-full or half-empty type of person.