July was music. It was singing along to Stevie Wonder at Black Weir Fields in Cardiff fulfilling a decades old dream. Joyous, happy crowds singing along to Superstition, Sir Duke and Loves in Need of Love filling my heart. It was sitting in gardens and pubs listening to musicians performing at our community music festival Ilkley Live. It was sitting back down at the piano, Andrea encouraging me to play and asking Emily if I could maybe, perhaps borrow her violin sometime. It was sun soaked ambles across new to me moorland paths with friends, sometimes alone.
It was day trips to see the Royal Academy Summer Exhibition, now an annual thing, and David Hockney at Salts Mill which is never not soothing. It was sea swims in Penarth, the first time I’ve dipped my toes in the water in three decades of visiting my sister and a six hour homeward bound conversation with middle child after completing his first year at uni. It was reading, reading and reading while grappling with writing my own words. It was discovering that I do have an imagination and I can write fiction. It was sketching the outline of this next phase of my writing life as the children make their way into the world and my husband job hunts.
It was coaching calls with Sarah Raad and searching the cupboard for bed linen. The nest is open, not empty I heard someone say on Instagram. It’s a revolving door, arms forever open, ready to listen. It was, ‘Have you still got a key’ and ‘No, there isn’t as much food in the house as there used to be’ against the soundtrack of the fridge door opening and closing.
It was walking to the vets to collect Bella’s ashes and walking home along the riverside, bumping into friends who took us into their home to feed us tea and bacon butties and love.
It was the house crackling with energy as the middle child landed back from Cardiff. It was the eldest bringing a softer energy from Newcastle. It was the young person who’d been in care and lived with us for their A levels returning after their first year at university. Disoriented maybe to be back in this town that is home, but isn’t and wondering where home is now?
It was middle and eldest sons not seeing each other at home, missing each other by a day, but somehow managing to find each other in the shadows of Sacre Coeur in three deep crowds for the final laps of the Tour de France. In France separately on holiday. It was flying to Mallorca for a same same but different summer holiday as last year with husband, the 16-year-old and her friend and it was home to Storm Floris.
This year it’s been throwing the jigsaw pieces up in the air and wondering where the pieces will fall. It’s been a visceral need, desire to be at home. July bucked that trend.
August brings birthdays, mine, my cousin. my sister, my niece and my sister-in-law. August is London again for a Prom and a wander with my sisters. August is bedrooms emptying, coach and train tickets out of town with shouts of, ‘See you at Christmas’. August is moonlight swims at the lido.
August is putting the new jigsaw puzzle together, finding those outer edges with the straight lines. August is listening to my voice, hearing what it’s saying and leaning into it. It’s reading and re-reading Antonia Taylor and Andrea Mann’s wise words on finding our voice. It’s the irony of helping my clients to find their voice whilst sometimes struggling to find my own.
August is GCSE results and digging out tents and dispensing stay safe advice to the Leeds Fest bound teenager, a rite of passage round here. August is continuing the summer reset. It’s a new website for my client writing. It’s keeping on keeping on with the fiction writing now that the creative writing course has finished, and it’s giving space for these Gently Does It letters to meander and evolve to where, I don’t know yet.