annanotbob's Diaryland Diary ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- like a sleepy golden storm The Glastonbury tickets arrived this morning, gulp. I have no idea whether I'm going to go or not, but even if I do, I won't do the poetry workshops. No chance. I spoke to Dot about it, about what TC would think if I didn't do them and she said he knows I'm well flaky at the moment and I can do whatever I want, I'm on his team as long as I want to be. Which is cool - nice to have options. I'm thinking I might just turn up on the Sunday for Leonard Cohen then fuck off back home again. I mean, Leonard Cohen! It's not every day you get the chance to see Len: Blimey - when I looked for a clip of him I found one from the Isle of Wight festival in 1970, so I've seen him before! Not a hint of a trace of a memory, even when I watched it, but there you go. Sara's preparing for the festival by cutting her hoodies so that they're really short and using the material to make ears for the hoods. Cat's ears and bear's ears so far. Taking Ma out was horrible. She's so bitter and miserable and patronising. We went to see Mary, the widow of Johnny, Ma's younger brother. She was horrible to Mary all the time Johnny was alive, inviting him for holidays to give him a break from her, that kind of thing. Now she's 'poor Mary', but not in any kind of a good way. I took them to put flowers on his grave and there was wrangling over who should arrange the flowers, who is chief mourner. I just sat down in the grass, stroking Millie and looking out over the countryside till they'd finished. I didn't like John, Ma is a fucking nightmare, but Mary is a gentle soul and I tried to enjoy spending time with her. She comes from a line of gardeners - her father, uncle and grandfather were all gardeners on the big estate till it had to be sold off, staff to lord whatever. Wherever she's been, she always pinches a cutting or a seedhead and they always take, so a walk round her garden is a trip through the great gardens of the southern counties. She's not doing much this year - losing John knocked her for six and she's in her mid 70s - but she was up a ladder wielding a pair of clippers in the direction of a hedge when we arrived, so she hasn't given up. Ma gave me a birthday card with my first name and my surname written on the envelope and nothing at all written on the card. It somehow made me feel at peace with the whole thing - I can go through the motions of being a dutiful daughter to an ageing parent (she's approaching 88), up to a point, some of the time, just as she was able to meet the obligations of being a parent to me as a small child, a bit, now and then. I don't like her, but I do love her; she likes me but doesn't love me. God knows what will happen when she dies as she has very difficult relationships with all three of her 'real' children, my brothers and sister, shitloads of resentment. Ah well. Fuck her, really. I might be halfway round the bloody bend a lot of the time, but I'm very very glad I'm me and not her. 11:34 p.m. - 10/06/2008 ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
||||||