More Memoirs. Morbidity, Anxiety and Mortality. Why not visit us?

Morbidity, Anxiety and Mortality.  Why not visit us.

I've already written about the apparent 100% mortality rate of living around here.  It's carnage. The plaintive crying of the little lambies when they are separated from their mums and the heart rendering effort-packed mooing of the Mums when their calves are taken from them.  It's like children saying goodbye to parents when they are sent away to boarding school at the mere tender fragile of age of 6. Poor little cute lambies.  They are taken in a big green truck either to be shipped live to somewhere, and who knows that lambies and calves don't get sea sick, or to be hung by their hind legs in what is euphemistically called 'the works'.  Most days we tell Lamborghini, Lambrusco, Lambnie and Jack not to venture out of the estate and certainly go no where near a Big Green Truck - BGT - Bloody Great Thing.

These deer lower legs were scattered on the road about 3 kms from us.

The mortality rate at 354 is, so far more like about 2% with all death as a result of unknown or natural causes.  Pulpy kidney in Lambretta and Duckitis in both Sir Francis 1st and Sir Francis 2nd. The 2 drakes.  Duckitis: inflammation of somewhere in a the duck of unknown aetiology.  The other 2 ducks got into a trap and very sadly starved.

Today marks any old anniversary of  when my life may have changed for some reason!  I've had sleepless and sometimes tearful nights.  Things change; shit happens. Things change and things get better.  I've had nights of deep sleep and blissful dreams, awaking refreshed and happy.

We sat eating our home made cheddar, with bread made from grain that I had milled.  Suddenly, from up above a bloomin' great Australasian hawk swooped down and sat on the lawn.  I scootled out hoping not to see Victoria Peck'am being torn to shreds.  I think it was a mouse.  What a thing to happen on the front lawn. It emphasised the might and fragility of life. Sometimes the emotional turbulence, the constant oscillation between hope and despair can be so draining. Yes, there have been moments of intense loneliness and desolation. Moments when life seemed too much to bear.  I remember the numb feelings of disbelief.

 

Life moves on, school is over, work is behind us and we are lucky enough to settle into 'retirement', which is only retirement from the daily duty of going into to be paid to do some work. It all seems like a good conclusion to the past eras of hiccups and good fun before an entry to eternity and fun in paradise.

I wonder why I get so anxious.  With the amount of time I spent in the head master's office for being what I put down to 'youthful exuberance' and the naivety of being a kid, you'd have thought I would have expended all anxiety about 50 years ago.  It was a horrible boarding school.  In a bored moment someone decided it was a good idea to fill the toilet pan with paper and put a match to it.  I don't know, but maybe there was an ulterior motive of burning the darned place down.  Or maybe they hated the fact there were no doors on the cubicles as much as I did. As the flames fluttered around I decided that a good responsible thing to do was to pull the chain.  The porcelain was hot and the water was cold.  The pan just kinda collapsed in many pieces.  Oh soddit.  Trouble was imminent and I never lit the paper, I actually put the fire out.  In came the master on duty, and asked "what has happened here".  The answer seemed too obvious, so I said "Sir, it looks like someone has shit a brick".  He looked at me, strangely unamused and sent me on my way to the headmaster's office AGAIN.  Like the present Wigan situation, there is no justice.   I once wore a blood pressure monitor for a Wigan game; Kath saw what was happening and said "Richard, you are going to die", all for a Wigan corner!!  I bet I wouldn't have got a minute of clapping. It was all done in the name of medical research. Oh how I remember the last 8 minutes of every game, sitting on the edge of my seat as we headed into 'finger nail time' and the sense of relief when the final whistle was blown. When the final cheque is paid for a longstanding debt and the relief of knowing no further action is needed to get what is rightfully owed. Such pleasure. I love it.

Ali and I have just been down the road with some friends.  We go most Sunday evenings, usually to eat a mediocre take away curry, but as there is only one place to get it, I suppose if the judgement is made in comparison, it is excellent.  After whatever we eat we then head down stairs and play pool.  If you can imagine how excited I got at football, just imagine how it is when I pot a ball, not least the black.  Anyway, Ali is putting in some stunning shots with a slightly unorthodox style, a bit like "Geordie Gomez who scores when he wants".  It is a lot of fun, usually stupid fun with some good conversations.  That's nice for me, because as a self confessed 'social cripple', normalising friendships can take a long time and even then trepidation abounds.  I don't know why.  It's the old anxiety thing again, but also maybe never having been in one place to really establish a good friendship.  In a way I suppose, because of that, criticism can be very challenging.

We've had a great run of very lovely people coming to visit, who have been lovely company and provided lotsa laughs and interesting chat.  You know how it is though, you never visit your own local attractions until you have a visitor.  So off we went to Palliser lighthouse where seals lay in the sun and the babies played in the small 'seal kindergarten' pools.  It's important to have things to do because I always worry about what I will say next, or be criticised about asking too much.

 

Nature brings us such lovely little moments of joy.  As we drove up to our gate this morning, there on the top rail, just having a break was a kingfisher.  So relaxing to watch, and that is what I like.  Relaxation and a removal from reality.

But what is all this anxiety about.  A sense of never being quite good enough, not knowing the cause of  unpleasantries and unsubstantiated accusations, unable to fathom out a reasonable solution or not being helped to find one.  Maybe trauma and various kinds of abuse contribute to anxiety. Maybe stress and anxiety caused by possible illness, who knows.  People say not to recall horrible times of the past, but actually I have just found it therapeutic.  Most of the time I am surrounded by the present and it is truly smashing, but recently I found various letters and emails.  My hec, reading them it was all a lot worse than I remember.  Thank heavens I've forgotten so much!!   It seems so incongruous when so much is so ideal.  However, as I am aware of it, I do my best to manage it.  Sometimes that amounts to distractions.  And here they come!

It's been a bit wet this summer but as you will see it hasn't held us back much, even so the resident ducks seem a bit hacked off with it.  Little do they know how lucky they are that they aren't living a few hundred kms further north where there has been serious +++ flooding, or that they don't fly .... it's the carnage of the duck shooting season at present.

I think I have changed a lot over the years, with, as a result no doubt of many serious mistakes along the way. The journey has presented me with challenges I could never have imagined or expected. These things forcing me to confront many realities about my own sense of normality and mortality. I have changed in character, become more resilient as well as more flexible and relaxed as well as less questioning and dogmatic.

My hec! Yesterday was a 'full-on' day of distractions.  About 6 hours of chain sawing one of our pine trees and stacking the subsequent rings ready for the log splitter. Our good neighbour then cut 2 more down for us for our winter warmth in a year's time.  We both still have all our limbs and digits and the full-on concentration and distraction was good for therapeutic purposes.  I actually slept really well and that was a delightful treat.  At least if you visit you will be warm. 

  

Any visitors will be glad to know that we now have a viable alternative when the earthquake happens.  The composting loo has moved from the porch outside to its own cubicle with a very good view and a lockable door.  Wood shavings from the chain sawing are used.  It is very environmentally sensitive and reduces our carbon footprint.  I'd say worth a visit.

Sadly this seasons work at the vineyard has come to a close, the last job being taking the nets off the vines.  For the last lap Ali came to drive the tractor, another first for the urban to rural GP.  Payment was very fair; a bottle an hour and a delicious apple and cinnamon cake.  No complaints; why not come and visit!  I've always been pretty peripatetic in my work, having started life as a road sweeper, moving on to a domestic assistant at an outdoor centre peeling potatoes, making beds and sweeping floors.  I moved onto taking kids climbing, paddling and all other such fun things.  Life at the posh Langdale Timeshare sweeping the squash courts and vacuuming the pool was followed by a van driver, driving twice a day between Preston and Morecambe.  I ended up not being very successful as a programme officer for an arts outfit even though I enjoyed a lot of it.  Radiography was good and a nice way to end an eclectic mix.  I thought I was ended until we came here and I find myself having fun on the vineyard.  The olive grove next week.  Ali takes full credit for the success as a radiographer, for the first time in my life I had interest and encouragement in what I was doing.  It was a rather delightful novel experience.  She drives the tractor.

The season of stunning sun rises is back.  Or more likely I'm seeing more of them now because the sunrises are at the time I usually get up.  Five thirty is really too early.  It is so encouraging to start the day with beauty.  It adds purpose.

Navigating the physical and emotional tumult has on occasions been straight forward but sometimes it hasn’t been easy, but it’s shaped me. Each setback, every moment of despair, every success has been a step on the path to finding strength in vulnerability and optimism. I know that there have been times along the way when I have screwed things up and I have not been very easy to be with.  That has caused sorrow and regret.  The things I may have got right brought some happiness.  Look at our vegetables!!

The cost of living crisis has hit New Zealand with food banks not having enough stock to supply all those that want it.  We've been fortunate in that we have been so productive in the vegetable garden that we haven't bought any vegetables for 6 - 8 months.  That is all very well if you like carrots, celery, celeriac, tomatoes, leeks, kholRabi, dakon radish, cucumbers, pumpkins, kumara, grapefruit, feijoas, tangerines and squash.  If you visit your diet will be added to a bit by the cheddar, blue, BlueRock brie, halloumi, ricotta and feta we make.  With any luck, and it seems to rely on luck, there could be some eggs.  The life of self sufficiency carries on and I'm ok with it.  We had good crops at the Coventry allotment and spent many hours there with great fellow allotmenters.  Here I talk to the ducks and chickens and we all seem to get on together pretty well.

  

And a few random stories to finish off with.  This wooden road side bench was carved on the tree trunk by the farmer for his children to sit in whilst awaiting the school bus, even a staircase is cut into the trunk.  Cool eh?  All one piece.

Just a nice coloured frog.

When you come to stay you will be reassured that the emergency rural fire brigade have had their training session and that the windows will be clean.

You may well have heard about the recent spate of 'ram raids' and thefts from shops.  Wayward youths have little better to do and are encouraged by the gangs.  The Opposition solution is 'boot camps' and 'short, sharp shock', I'd take a guess there will be a few more broken toilet pans. This lady, who makes very delicious coffee is so concerned that her 'Airstream' coffee caravan is going to be next she has secured it to a very valuable dustbin.

The gate is so valuable the council don't want it stolen, or all the surrounding fence has already gone.

A random I met on a recent walk.  I instantly fell in love with her, and here she is offering me encouragement.  It's amazing.

In a beautiful world, looking off to nowhere.

  

These guys are our mates but they cause anxiety, I suspect it is something to do with either attachment or detachment theory.  This morning, after a heavy night eating BlackJack was having a snooze in the Garden Terrace.  All four usually stick together, but the other three were nowhere to be seen.  Talk about panic attack and anxiety levels going up.  I had my wellies on faster than a jackrabbit goes down its hole.  Off I went on a sheep hunt, as if there aren't enough here already with about 55 million.  The others had chosen to dry out in the sun.  We've had a lot of rain and not a lot of sun.  The relief was palpable.  I'm sure you palpated it.

Tomatoes sun drying out side the medical centre.

STOP PRESS:  Two more alpacas arrived today, but please don't ask me why!!

If you want a different perspective of the same thing, have a look here:  richetal.wordpress.com