April, May, June

Over the past three months I’ve made a couple of attempts to write blog posts without managing to finish any. When things don’t feel like they’re going right it feels too painful to dwell on and recount my past month as a round-up. Ruminating ain’t good for anyone. April and May felt like hard months, or rather were hard months that I had to endure until I felt on a level again. I sunk myself into the allotment, taking on a tremendous amount of work with the progress at the plot looking like night and day when comparing pictures from late March and late April.

April is my birthday month which compounded a feeling of loneliness I’ve been carrying for sometime. I know lots of people, but I have very few (sometimes none) that ask to hangout or talk to me enough to know where I’m at. It’s gotten to the point that I feel like I’m begging people to hang out as I suggest something, they say they’re busy but would like to hangout sometime, I suggest something else weeks later, they say they’re busy again with no suggestion of a date to rearrange. I just have very few balanced friendships, and realistically need to let some fall by the wayside. While I’ve been ill people have been supportive with messages but this rarely translates into anything more than surface level hellos or look at the thing I made/bought/saw. I have many many days where I don’t get to talk to anyone. I was desperate to find a social group or hobby group that I could meet semi-regularly to have social interaction – but this still felt impossible in April and May as my cognitive dysfunction was still pretty severe. A rock and a hard place, weighing up my need for social interaction against my ability to do so.

Luckily my sister is a gorgeous person and when I asked if I could stay with her for a couple of days in Bristol on my birthday week she was super excited and planned a couple of days activities together. We went to Watershed to watch The Northman, ate amazing food including some great Thai food, and spent a day in Bath seeing the sights as well as having afternoon tea at The Pump Room.

Rolling into May I still kept feeling down and lonely about not getting to see friends. As part of my recovery I’m trying to learn to invest in myself and do things for myself rather than for others all the time. But when I look above the parapet and see almost no one is bothered about talking to me unless I contact them… well I guess it feels sorrowful and a bit humiliating. I researched in-person groups/events (of which there is very little) in my area and haven’t yet found anything promising. Early in May, I met up with my friends that I go foraging with to woods in Warwickshire to see bluebells. These friends are very good to me as we talk through messages every week and they suggest plans for walks or getting food together once a month. I also met up a couple of times one-to-one with people I used to work with who I hadn’t seen in person since before the pandemic – it was super lovely to see them and they seemed relieved that outwardly I seem like my old warm self.

Late May I went away for a week with family (I’ve written more below about this). I felt happy and relaxed while being on holiday and during the week in the evenings I mustered the will to start applying for online social activities. Throughout June I ended up trialling a few options and have settled on a Monday D&D group. I’ve also got back into swimming over the past couple of weeks which has been great. I swim in the sea any chance I get but I haven’t been to swimming baths in ten years or more. Dealing with changing rooms and the etiquette of swim lanes felt daunting but once I was in the pool again for the first time it felt super easy. I’ve been coping with D&D and swimming well and I’m enjoying myself. Out of nowhere from circumstances I wasn’t expecting I started talking to someone that I’ve become super close with over the past month. I’ve felt dead inside and incapable of having even a crush on someone for so long, whatever this is has hit me like a tsunami. I feel completely blind-sided and overwhelmingly happy all at once. It’s hard to get my head around how I feel or how it’s come to be, but I’m enjoying it for what it is.

I decided to finally write a monthly (or three at once) blog post because I realised that this day two years ago was the day I became catatonic. This anniversary of sorts has creeped up on me as I’ve finally been distracted this past month with happy things, the first time for this to happen not just in two years but for a very long time. I want these blog posts to be a testament for myself when in future I look back at this time in my life. I’ve still got a ways to go before I recover my health, with my cognitive dysfunction and tiredness being my main day to day struggle. But every time I look at how far I’ve come over the past three months, and the three months before that, and the three months before that… I can see clearly how much progress I’ve made in looking after my health and building a future for myself. And I’m incredibly proud of myself.

The Good Life

April saw apple blossom, forget-me-nots, dandelions and lots of wild flowers make an appearance. May is for bluebells, cow parsley, strawberry flowers and clover with later in the month the first bean and squash flowers. June is for roses, even more wild flowers, tomatoes and chillies setting in, and lots of courgette flowers.

At the allotment I dug five beds for squash, beans, potatoes, rhubarb and wild flowers in April and a further four for sunflowers, tomatoes, courgettes and a mix of onions and beetroot in May. I also drove three 6ft metal scaffolding poles into the ground to build a bean frame on to – I was advised by other allotment holders that without this my frame would likely break in the wind due to the site being exposed.

I’ve done more research on how to make compost. I have a wormery set up that I add vegetable scraps, grass and cardboard to. Worms benefit from having calcium added to their diet so I’ve been saving egg shells and grinding them down to add into the mix. I have a big compost bin made out of wood pallets which I placed a lot of the initial green waste from the site into when I was clearing the plot. I’ve now made a new pile that I’m adding household waste, grass clippings, coffee grounds and cardboard to. This new pile I’m able to turn over and manage more easily. I’m thinking of building a lean-to shelter mainly so I can collect more rain water (I have guttering on the greenhouse too), and I can potentially manage composting piles under this structure.

I’ve now planted all of my spring crops to be harvested late summer. At some point I need to work out what to plant as winter crops – for now I’ve bought bird’s foot trefoil and red and white clover seeds to use as green manure / catch crops.

By the end of May I had made a crazy amount of progress in just a few weeks and the plot finally looks like a proper allotment. Unfortunately I injured one of my knees with all the digging but thankfully I could still go for walks etc. – just no deep squats or wild lunges. I restarted doing yoga more seriously to strengthen and stretch my joints to hopefully avoid future injuries.

By the end of June I have lots of beans (broad, french, runner) growing, potato plants remaining healthy, lots of onions and beetroot going strong, fat squash growing bigger by the day, and tomatoes starting to pollenate and fruit. My courgette plants are going crazy with maybe 10+ fruit already on each plant. The same with my squash, they’ve stretched all over the paths and have 12+ fruit and still trying to produce more flowers. I’m snipping off ends of vines and cutting back foliage on fruiting plants where I can to stop them over-reaching themselves so they can put their energy into the fruit already setting.

I’ve entered into the city-wide newcomer allotment holder competition and had my plot judged mid June. I’m not entirely sure what the process is, I think I get judged again in September before they decide on the winners. But it’s very cute that they even run a competition, and the Chair of our site and other plot holders seem to be super excited that I’ve entered and are rooting for me.

Into the sea

I went to Gwenydd for a week with family at the end of May. We stayed in Harlech with my grandparents to take them on a holiday. The weather was mixed but the scenery was as impressive as ever – I know the area well from many past holidays but it never gets old. I didn’t go on any major hikes as I was wary of the toll on my poorly knee. However I did brave swimming in the sea (even though it was rough!) and I walked from the top of Harlech (above the castle on top of the hill) down to the nature reserve along the dunes and back where I saw hermit crabs and lots of different sea birds.

I also walked to St Tanwyg church nestled in amongst the sand dunes at Llandanwg. It’s a tiny medieval church on the site of one of the oldest places of continuous Christian worship in the UK beginning in C.435AD. This area of Wales formed part of ancient Irish kingdoms at different points and it’s thought that the church was set up by St Patrick and his followers as part of their efforts to convert the pagan Britons. The church houses a collection of ancient stones from the 5th and 6th century found around the site, some of which have been used as lintels in the structure of the medieval built church.

The oldest of the stones has the name Engennus/Ingenuus inscribed, dates from the 5th century and is made of stone from Ireland. Another stone from the 6th century has the name “Equestrinomine” inscribed which is only otherwise found in Italy and Gaul. Both of these stones paint a picture of a wealthy man called Ingenuus founding the religious site bringing a stone from Ireland in the 5th century, Tanwg then arrived in the 6th century and became the patron saint of Llandanwg with religious backup from fellow priests like Equestrinomine from Gaul.

I love this kind of stuff and have spent a lot of time exploring medieval castles and ancient burial mounds in north and mid Wales. Lots of the stone wall field boundaries covering the landscape are made up of stones hewn three to five thousand years ago and reused over and over again until the present day. They’re like round footballs completely smoothed with time and use. All the way down the coast through to Pembrokeshire there are massive thick walls (two meters wide) down by the coastline that almost look like the foundations of medieval castles but spread out in long lines. These are defensive barriers that ancient peoples could rely upon to slow down slavers and pillagers coming in by sea to give locals time to run out of sight to safety further inland.

Things I’ve watched

I watched five films in April, five films in May and three films in June. I was going to deep dive some of these but this post is already incredibly long. I guess I might write something and post it separately or as part of my eye-dosing yearly round up of film watching. A quick overview:

I rewatched The Witch (2015) knowing I was going to see The Northman (2022) on release. I still enjoyed The Witch on a rewatch but I guess I don’t get why it’s so spellbinding to some. There’s a cult following online that to me over-eggs Eggers’ film making abilities. He’s no doubt a great director, but his writing isn’t that interesting to me. The Northman was straight up a 300 type film, bombastic spectacular visuals and deeply researched but with 2D characters poorly cast in some cases. Viking culture and stories were dripping in humour and this was dry as all hell. I left feeling what’s the point, why would someone want to make this, even though I enjoyed it for the popcorn movie it was.

I watched Showgirls (1995) for the first time paired with the recent documentary You Don’t Nomi (2019) which looks at the initial reaction and cultural impact of Paul Verhoeven and Joe Eszterhas’s controversial flop. I really enjoyed Showgirls, it’s very clearly satirising America’s approach to sex and women’s bodies and to me it was super cathartic and enjoyable if not completely successful as a project. Nomi’s reactionary behaviour and sky-high emotional responses that apparently were heavily criticised on release feel realistic to me given her traumatic past and circumstances, and it felt cathartic or reassuring to see that kind of character treated sympathetically. There are plenty of elements that don’t work or don’t pay off, but I enjoyed it and found success in it as a satirical exercise all the same.

Other great watches include: Born In Flames (1983), The Brood (1979), The Personal History of David Copperfield (2019), Everything Everywhere All At Once (2022). I rewatched Predator (1987) as I’ve only seen it the once when I was in my early teens. Friends and Strangers (2021) is an Australian mumblecore film, or maybe used the mumblecore genre to do some interesting character study work in a film whose plot it meandering and aimless – but this serves a purpose in what we come to understand about the characters within. I’ve watched half of The House That Jack Built (2018), I love Lars Von Trier’s films and although I knew this is a very dark film going in I underestimated my readiness for it and got too sad (oops). I plan to watch the second half this week.

Great Freedom (2021) and In the Aisles (2019) both star Franz Rogowski who is excellent with very different performances in both. Great Freedom got a lot of traction, I don’t want to say much about it I just think you (whoever you are if you’re reading this) should watch it. I love films that focus in on ordinary people, not in an underdog any-one-can-triumph kinda way, instead showing the realities and intricacies of normal people’s live. Everyday trials and tribulations. Documenting these very real lives through art and reflecting on the ways things are and how they come to be. In the Aisles is such a film and I loved it. It’s a drama following people working in a supermarket in Austria, and it’s truly beautiful.