Smokingboot

There's a thing I do sometimes, when waking approaches and I'm not ready; I know it's on its way because I become aware of my own heart beat. And if, in that state, I just listen, eventually it may slow and fade out in the return to sleep. But in that time of listening images may come too. This works best if they are not forced, not even touched. The best way to describe this is that whatever comes into ones mind should rise more like bubbles from a spring than bubbles in boiling water. The latter can be just as valid but with pressure there is also the chance of forcing a vibe or a narrative. Intent pushes too hard, leave it be. Just go back to sleep.

This time I heard my heart beating and decided to follow the beat that turned into the march of many people through the gates of a temple complex. I say march, it was not rigorous, quite informal, and dissipated quickly. Someone said something about the temple having all the cosmos in it, which seemed a bit extravagant to me. I saw a door opening in stone and beyond it something like a cloister. It was for me so I went through it.

Beyond lay a short cliff top plateau facing the same opposite, though this latter was covered in trees. It had been day in the complex but this was all night-time silhouette, over a vast long gorge below, out of which lifted the vivid pinks and greens of the Northern Lights, as if they could come out of the earth. But this could not be right surely.

It seemed very strange that in the Temple of the Constant Heart (how did I know its name?) there could be this anomaly, an area that looked like a cloister but when you got there was actually a place of potential danger and wildness. There was room enough on the rocky plateau, but the edge seemed abrupt. Not so much that you were in immediate danger of tumbling down the mountain but definitely a place where accidents might beset the unlucky or unwary.

I came back in and was shown a treasure, an ancient beautifully embroidered belt, with a design of two suns. The buckle was designed like their rays interacting in the space between them. There was much gold. I can't recall if the guardian of it let me pick it up but suspect she did. She was an old nun in white. I stared at it with the idea percolating through my head that inconstancy is a failing I punish thoroughly - these were the words that came to me, but the nun didn't say anything - I don't know who said them. The next realisation was an understanding that for all my reaction to those I consider inconstant, I am not entirely devoid of that flaw myself.

But sure, in my own language, stars have a connection with constancy. I left the room of the belt and realised I could hear my own heart no more, sinking back into the quiet of sleep.

Edited to add: Oh wait, it's Shakespeare's birthday, so stars and constancy make perfect sense today.

Sonnet 116

Let me not to the marriage of true minds
Admit impediments; love is not love
Which alters when it alteration finds,
Or bends with the remover to remove.
O no, it is an ever-fixèd mark
That looks on tempests and is never shaken;
It is the star to every wand'ring bark
Whose worth's unknown, although his height be taken.
Love's not time's fool, though rosy lips and cheeks
Within his bending sickle's compass come.
Love alters not with his brief hours and weeks,
But bears it out even to the edge of doom:
If this be error and upon me proved,
I never writ, nor no man ever loved.

Or less well known Sonnet 14

Not from the stars do I my judgment pluck,
And yet methinks I have astronomy—
But not to tell of good or evil luck,
Of plagues, of dearths, or seasons’ quality;
Nor can I fortune to brief minutes tell,
Pointing to each his thunder, rain, and wind,
Or say with princes if it shall go well
By oft predict that I in heaven find.
But from thine eyes my knowledge I derive,
And, constant stars, in them I read such art
As truth and beauty shall together thrive
If from thyself to store thou wouldst convert;
Or else of thee this I prognosticate:
Thy end is truth’s and beauty’s doom and date.

So yes, thanks Bill. Happy Birthday!

I have worries. But none of them are mine to talk about and therefore... I just have worries. Maybe they will go soon.

We went to North Berwick, always good for us, a walk along the beach, looking at the shops. The sea was so calm and the sky was warm. Usually we have ice cream but this time it was doughnuts.

We did consider buying in North Berwick a long time ago, but connections into Edinburgh and Glasgow were too iffy. At that time, 10.30 was your latest train back out of Edinburgh; it creates such a hassle about watching shows or gigs, or even going to a restaurant. Plus, you were paying well over the odds for the post code. If we were to move there, I would want to be close to the sea rather than just be in a desirable area, and then what does one do out of season? While I would love to just sit and watch storms over the sea, one could be talking 6 months of rain and shops that close early. I have no idea which of these two North Berwicks is the real one, and suspect both are. But whatever time of year we visit, it always refreshes our spirits.

It's not nearly so great for our wallets. Every time I walk down the little high street, I am attacked by cute buyables. Yesterday it was a painting for 2 grand. We didn't get it but should have done. The last visit I bought a full length leopard print coat for around £90. Yesterday I saw leopard print trainers for £48, I'm probably going to buy them too. North Berwick seems determined to send me full leopard.

Waking dream this morning, rather strange. A kind of animation I don't have a name for, a cartoon of the sun with a man's body playing a piano. The piano was stripped back so that you could see part of its interior workings. He was playing some tinny off key stuff - deliberately - but there was very grand glorious music sweeping in behind him. He had birds sitting around listening, including crows. He looked up from his keyboard and smiled as I came close, but I didn't know if I was in person shape or a crow.

Lana Del Rey's Video Games. I cannot get rid of it, it's been like this for ages.

This is a strange song for me, I love it but tire of it quickly. And yet here it is over and over.

A dream the night before last, sofas and beds and maybe even buildings constructed in flower shapes, a huge bird of paradise plant big enough to be a viewing platform, a voice repeating 'Here come the people!' Emphasis on the first syllable of 'people' in a high pitched near-song. It repeated often, but the tune has faded away to be replaced by Lana again. Everything's been replaced by Lana for about four days. Very strange.

Bigger tester for Absolute Aphrodisiac because I like it enough to try more. The blurb goes: Absolute Aphrodisiac activates the carnal energies of animalic fragrance. It is a heady scent inviting white flowers and vanilla before overpowering with a rush of musk, amber, and castoreum.

'Chocolate cake!' Announced R as he walked into the room, 'delicious!'

I may have found the one.

I am scraped clean of sleep, almost.

Most of my sleep was deep and relaxed, all the better for R being home. There was a moment when someone named James took me to a strange Dali-esque garden in shadows, and showed me a large clock, like the Doomsday clock, so close to midnight.

'Late is the hour' came the voice. Shut up Gandalf. Did you wake me early to tell me the hour is late? No wonder Theoden got annoyed with you.

Remembering the mountains, the dreams where the soldiers are below in the dark, and it's time to go.

The dark, looking up at the moon through the smoke of a campfire, someone is cooking a mess of, what, beans? Not the same place. A skinny man with a bush beard speaks to me.

'Is the wind telling you things again?'

I push back my hair and tie it into a knot at the back, then realise Smokingboot doesn't do that. She seldom puts her hair up because she can't stop it pulling. Also these arms are much bigger than hers. Then I realise that these are somehow stacked dreams and the person who saw the soldiers on the mountain is being dreamseen by the tying-hair-back person at the campfire who listens to the wind. I am the one who observes both in succession.

Ugh, I don't want to be awake. Moocher cat is purring ready for breakfast, and yes the wind is talking a little. I remember that however much social media shrieks, the Professor and Clive and many people I admire lived through much worse than this. War's not close yet, if it ever comes this way at all. I wish it wasn't an issue anywhere, but have to face my own helplessness in the matter. All this is, is being close to klaxons sounding off all the time, infuriating, wracking us into a mass mental health crisis.

Got to fight off that nonsense.

All I can do is enjoy my life right now.

There's much work to do before excellent chum arrives this evening. So I could choose posh perfume that always gets me in the zone for work, or cheerful strawberry scent.

I could really use cheering up.

But work work. I'll feel really cheered up by getting this done.

So posh perfume today, strawberries tomorrow.

Dreams over the last three nights have been vivid.

I saw some kind of ram/goat with a big fluffy fleece and several sets of horns on its head. We were among rocks on a dry mountain. I followed as it led down past a stream between rocks and little patches of grass. I drank some of the water, which didn't taste of anything. The sheep waited for me and as soon as it saw me paying attention, carried on, jumping from rock to rock or ambling between stones. There were the rooftops of a village/town visible below, but the ram turned away from these, instead going round the curve of the hill, and right in front of me were three crosses. There were men on them, dead as far as I could tell. The reality of the mountainside and stream and village had gone, and the scene in front of me was like a Gustav Dore illustration, though very dark. The faces of the victims were in complete shadow but it was clear who the central one was meant to depict. The sheep stood there and so did I, not knowing what to do.

Then there was the night before last's dream, in which I met up with an old friend, a transwoman. I knew her before her transition, and she seemed to have...detransitioned? No, because this person was untouched by the decades we've known each other. Were we in the before? They/he was a tall and rather lovely man, only with hands uncharacteristically covered in gold rings. My friend seemed embarrassed about something, and I was confused too. Was this a catch up or a date? In real life we were just friends with no hankering on either side, but in the dream we were very close to each other. Whatever it was we were meant to talk about got lost in waffling.

Then I was elsewhere, practising how to write with an ink pen, at one point I blundered and wrote a sentence on a cheque. I concealed the mistake with a flood of ink. But after that I continued to practise.

This morning, I saw the sea. It was very real in its still haze, stretching far away. But I was outside, and either wearing shorts or a skirt cos my legs and feet were bare. I stood on an outcrop on a grassy hill and just watched, as a bagpipe tune began from somewhere. It was a fine piece, I got lost in it and the view. On my right when I turned to it there was a great cove of yellow sand. When I turned to the left, I think there must have been headland, but couldn't quite see it. I looked out in front again and saw a ship coming in, a galleon/large frigate maybe, passing so close I was watching it from above rather than from afar, and in comes the story; run, get out of here, you don't know who's coming.

There is a point where dream navigation needs to be hands off. I've been dreaming, lucid dreaming, having nightmares, experiencing visions when awake etc since I was young. It's easy for the conscious mind to get involved and deliberately make a story happen, pure head entertainment. Do you see the sea, really see it? OK, what's on that sea, a monster, a ship, a...? Great fun. But there's more to be found in not disturbing the process. Stay properly asleep. Neither bring in images wilfully nor stifle them. Touch nothing and see what percolates upwards. The ship was not the point of that dream, watching the sea and listening to the music in its complexity, that was the point. Especially since I can neither read nor write music, so in my head the remnants must stay.

My husband just sang to me. I tried to sing back but accidently gave a little eructation instead. It was quite ladylike, but nonetheless all the upstairs lights flickered off and back on. R saw it too, and we both reached the same conclusion: my radiation induced super-powers have arrived! Now to work out how to use them for good!

I had a strange dream. We were in a church, a whole bunch of nice genial people doing nice genial things. We had to go down to the crypt and one of our number locked us in down there, presumably going back into the church to steal stuff. I think this harks back to the amazing inaugural sermon courtesy of Bishop Mariann Edgar Budde, which I read for the first time yesterday: I'll keep it here so as not to forget it.

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Well, there it is, Christianity actively representing its founder's principles, 'Whatsoever you do to the least of these you do to me.' To me, it doesn't feel like an edict to capitulate to criminality or nonsense but a plea for perspective, and to understand how over-indulged chastisement may lead to greater wrongs than those it seeks to prevent.

And the thief in my dream? I guess that's awareness of the folk who take advantage of mercy. It's not enough to be innocent as doves you need the wisdom of serpents, or you're lucky if they just strip the Church instead of burning it to the ground.

Strange dream, a follow on from another possibly earlier this night, in which I was with a whole bunch of people, and a nice looking asian lady kept stealing my rainbow jello.

It may not have been jello, but it was definitely some kind of gel-like cream, and it was rainbow coloured. In this earlier dream that might not have happened, I left it on the side and came back to find her scooping it out without having asked me. She laughed so charmingly I had felt too embarrassed to mention it. But now, in the dream proper I returned from somewhere to find her doing it again, and more than half the pot was empty! She saw my expression and dashed away before I could say anything. I addressed the whole group, even though I could hear her crying in another room as I exposed the theft. Everyone heard me and accepted what I was saying though they took it all too lightly for my liking. They moved the situation on quickly and I followed suit. I woke wondering if I had been churlish.

I'll be keeping a note of dreams that turn up these days, because my radiotherapy began yesterday, and I can feel myself rebelling at it. It didn't hurt, there was nothing more than a very soft regular pulsing against my skin. I asked if this was normal, they said it was. The machines are loud and at least one makes noises that sounds like growls containing a repetitive ha-ha-ha! I didn't like any of it and kept my eyes closed. Then came yet more instructions about showers rather than baths (unless the baths are tepid. Who wants a tepid bath?) and being careful about anything on my skin.

I am now covered with smeared red pen marks. They gave me steroid cream and some moisturiser to put on for what seems like forever. What I really need is my rainbow jello but a dream thief nicked it.

'You don't need a pre-med for this,' said the anaesthetist, 'it's a twenty minute operation.' Trypanophobia is one of those issues that automatically gets downgraded to not liking needles.

'I don't like needles either,' said the anaesthetist.
'I don't like needles either,' said the nurse.

Yes, solidarity and all that, well done, came the voice in my head, either of you got a history of going into shock when injected? Or having a panic attack that results on trays full of stuff and large pieces of equipment being knocked away/ kicked across the room? Because if that's OK, come on and let the good times roll! They applied lots of emla cream instead, taped it over the back of the hand. The result was that the cannula didn't hurt as much but then a rather unpleasant pain started spreading. I was coughing, and felt nauseous.

'Breath deep,' said the anaesthetist, 'and look!' she showed me this machine, the answer to the question of why she had put ECG pads across my forehead, 'it's something we are trialling...'

Not on me I wanted to say, I didn't sign up for a trial!

'This shows your brain waves,' she said, waving at the screen, 'with it, we can be sure to give you exactly the right amount of anaesthetic. Young people need more, older people need less. We can create a bespoke service, just right for each person. Quite a few of my colleagues don't approve. They call it witchcraft,' she chuckled while I wondered if my face looked as dismayed as I felt, 'but it's the future!'

I was not out as instantly as I prefer, it took a few moments. Some ghastly head-scenarios vanished completely, and instead I was reassuring people (not the people in the room of course) that I was a passerine bird and would be back if they liked/ not if they didn't. Then I went away and later I was back. Nothing like as groggy as I had been the other times, ready and packed to go home before the necessary post-op hours were up. The nurses fortified me with water, juice, tea, sandwiches, biscuits and morphine. All OK, though this wound is more painful again. A few weird waves of nausea, but that's all.

The thing I missed most from last time was that strange choir singing on my way to the theatre; but last night's dreams made up for it all. These were full of music including my own. For some reason I started singing, and singing well too, warbling away complete with occasional jaw-waggle. I couldn't work out if my voice was sweet or not, but I was definitely hitting the right notes. Before dawn today I woke to hear one beautiful note on repeat outside, all the jackdaws and crows and gulls silent in its presence. My phone was nearby, I could have reached out to try and identify the bird with my trusty Merlin, but instead I just lay there and went back to sleep.

Note to self: If reincarnation turns out to be real, on no account am I going back to Renaissance Europe. Enough already! Instead, best bear straight towards 1920s Paris and sing and play like a passerine bird until 1940, when it's time to head for the States.

We've been invited to a Halloween party tonight, I have a tentacle dress to wear! But I just don't think I can do it. I will try to persuade R to go without me. At least one of us deserves a break.

Until last night.

Out went Biggie and in came Biggie, with what my husband at first dismissed as a mouthful of leaf. I detected a certain shape underneath the foliage and sure enough, Biggie dumped her prey which then shot away under the table and made its way to one of the sofas. Strange isn't it, no matter how old, blind, deaf, mad the cat, mouse presence still wakes them up, reminds them of who they are and what they do. Having banished the suddenly eager hunters from the front room, we sought said mouse and found him hiding under the fireplace. R got him and put him outside, but not before the little chap bit hard enough to get through the glove and draw blood.

Suddenly I was so glad we had all those shots, even though my inner Mother would prefer it if he got a tetanus booster. Her influence suddenly flared into mighty manifestation, as I found myself wishing we had her favourite cleansing liquid H2O2 rather than just Savlon and rubbing alcohol. Having said that, it is just hydrogen peroxide isn't it? I recall it stinging like a b*st*rd and being no more effective than Isopropanol. Anyway, he cleaned the wound with antiseptic and put a plaster on it. Should be fine.

Then came the dreams. An old friend of mine turned mad, and kept putting flowers I had cut upside down into vases full of water, 'drowning' them. Then my phone was basically blowing up with messages about someone I knew in the dream who was suffering some kind of full on mental breakdown, or had been ill for a long while. I was being referred to for help but I wasn't this person's guardian or any kind of executor/authority and had no idea what to do. Old foe was there again, this time looking close over my shoulder at some piece of writing or screen we were both meant to read. There was a recording of me presenting TV style. 'You can't act,' some woman told me, 'but you can do this.' I can't recall what we were reading or what screen-me was saying.

Cluttered distressed thoughts for no conscious reason. This did not have the oppressive squeeze of nightmare, I was just confused.

Then the image of a barn up high somewhere on forest covered hills, America in my head, then a close up of what seemed like some form of thick glass water bottle of a mottled blue material. It was old but very pretty.

I wake tired and anxious. Lovely couple of hours with mates yesterday and once again the flat in Malta was suggested as a bolt hole. Maybe we should take that up in early 2025.

I should write this down before it fades, like this beautiful morning all frost and yellow light with birds wheeling round the houses to chase insects or enjoy the wind. A short Autumn nearly done, early Winter on the doorstep. Brr! How can anything that looks so good feel so bad?

But quickly, to record the dream before it leaves.

Nasty old foe was there, comparatively well dressed, as was I. Where were we? Something like a university quadrant in an old city like Edinburgh or London, familiar to me, a merging of both and more places. He and I were going somewhere and he touched my shoulder gingerly. Then, as we walked, he quickly grew more confident, and moved his arm more securely, sometimes around my waist, sometimes around my shoulder. It wasn't romantic, more tender and affectionate and I was delighted.

He had much to show me including a friend of his, a standard gradlad, pale with fawn coloured hair and a long thin face. When the young man put his arm out to shake hands, I noticed he had no musculature really, very much the stereotype of the boy who stays home reading. His name was Golden.I could not help comparing him with a chum, John Golden, who died many years ago of what I think was a heart attack. This gentle diffident chap couldn't be less like John, who was a big ruddy round man and perhaps the most ferocious and bitingly articulate politico I ever met, but the name made me think.

IA took me to his house, which was comfortably untidy with a kitten playing in a shoe. Then he took me to meet more people I didn't know, including a bartender behind this tiny almost sealed off cocktail unit, more like a pod than a bar. The bartender made us both a shot and chaser which he called 'Elders Green.' I assumed its name came from elderflowers. When I looked at the two drinks, I noticed that both had a vague chartreuse colour to them, but the shot was darker than the chaser. Someone told me that the shot was a 'hard' drink. Literal as ever, I wondered if it meant it was physically hard like ice. I was still staring at it as IA drank his, because suddenly I wasn't sure. Were we dead? Where were we again? Maybe this was down to watching Hades being depicted in Kaos, or my own customs from whence the warnings come: If you don't know what world you're in, careful what you eat and drink, careful what you give and take. Underworld food = don't know, fairy food = don't care, but everything is interchangeable and there are many more possibilities than these.

Fading, all fading in the morning. I enjoyed it, and I enjoy this beauty too. Time to put the coffee on.