A season without words

But so much noise of other kinds

It’s been a season of few words. At least, the kind of words that form a newsletter of any sort. 30 something drafts, fragments becoming the beginning of something but not ripe for sharing. It has been a season for familiar kitchen tables and on blankets on grass and quiet, early morning voicenotes to friends far away, hypothesising only the delicious and ridiculous. It has been a season full of feeling; of image, colour, sense and sensation. These things are languages in their own right, so I won’t say it hasn’t been noisy, or many of noise’s synonyms: Clamorous, clangorous, raucous, rackety. And sometimes there is silence, brimming full with something other than sound. Is this making sense? I’ve been full. Full up. Too full to speak without digesting. Too tight in the throat to relax into the sentences that form any sort of essay.

These seasons happen, they are not new to me. But perhaps I’m growing a new appreciation for them. Less apologetic, less ‘I’ll be back soon!’. I’m here - I was always here - just with less to say. I’m listening. I’m deciphering. I’m being. Not in an ear-pricked, ‘Do you hear that?’ kind of way; more ‘Oh - and then what happens?’. Not more of anything, just fewer obstructions between source and sensation.

Ironically, I felt the silence break at the beginning of a conversation with a new friend. I’ve written fairly consistently ever since. Immediately before the words left, there were loads of them. Too many. I’ve come through the other side of this verbal quiet with a stronger sense of which of those words mean something, and which were noise. I think that probably needed to happen. And I’m sure it’ll happen again.

So where have I been while I’ve had fewer words?

It’s taken me eight years, but I’m learning to use bed as a space in its own right. I’ve not spent any more time here than usual - my body ebbs and flows in a rhythm that takes me more and less back to bed - but when there are fewer words, time here changes. All time changes, I’ve noticed. Bed selfies are a language of themselves, amongst friends.

My parents grew rhubarb by mistake. Picking it, cleaning it, roasting it and eating it hit every sense and plucked at several heartstrings. This July marks 16 years of living in Leeds, one corner of a 9-square-mile area known for producing forced rhubarb: The Rhubarb Triangle. When the words go quiet, and the feelings aren’t forced into a shape acceptable to others, fear, grief, immense joy and belonging become a colourful landscape. I’ve been walking there lately.

I have read most mornings and every night for weeks. I’ve read Broadcast Talks aloud to my partner in chunks over voice messages, just like our early days reading to one another in lockdowns. We have laughed and grimaced and pondered slowly together. I’ve read Sophie Strand and Polly Atkin before sleep, both writers who live with chronic illness and have developed particular relationships with the living landscape. In both cases, this relationship hasn’t cured them - I’m grateful to them for saying so. My body is up for discussion as I go through a process of potential diagnosis or, more likely, diagnoses. I’ve paused a few times, wondering if reading about bodies and illness before bed was a well timed choice. But my gut says yes.

I encounter my partner in pieces more than half the time. He is still beautiful, but my heart feels the glitches.

Music or birds and breeze. My playlists have gone places - roamed and wandered and crossed wires. Gigs, live theatre. Friends have shared projects in progress, records on the brink, and I’ve walked them whole down the river. Thick stories in baselines, entire joyrides in one vocal quip. Sound and vision in bucket.

I’ve been taking part in a leadership course that doesn’t seem to want me to be myself. Except it tells me I should I really be myself, and there’s only one of me and my skills are particular and special, but I don’t feel very seen. In fact I feel actively unseen. It’s not a good way to feel so I’ve used my bodily presence, wherever possible, to show I see. I see you.

Crisp. Crunchhh. Sizzle. Mmm.

Beauty in the mundane. I made no apologies for ignoring many other things to do this. To do life in small and boring ways with people I love. We buy so many apples. I say we won’t get through them before they turn to mush but we always do.

I stay with my partner for a week or so of each month, so have become unhappily reliant on weather forecasts to help me decide outfits for the ten days ahead of myself. Except the weather isn’t playing like that. Maybe it never did, but 26 degree temperature fluctuations do seem particular. My form has felt them like they’re particular this year. I packed for Spring and spent my last visit switching between the two long sleeved tops I’d brought and my only jumper. One of his too, just for a change. The following week I was too hot in linen. Someone left these three rocks on this sun drenched bench - I figured they would want me to take a photo.

I have drawn nearly every day. Sometimes for minutes. Occasionally for hours. This one is a portrait. It looks just like them.

And the river. The rivers; now I have two. Both speak to me clearly and with certainty. And the light meets them… just so. There we go - words’ limitations kicking in.

More soon.