I Write A Present

Travel Advice

For Anna Dreda to celebrate her birthday, 

and wth thanks for her many kindnesses

The decision about whether or not to set off

in the first place, whether to sit it out, to wait

for better weather seems ludicrous

in retrospect. 

                         Three inches of snow either

disappears into grey by lunchtime, or expands

to make things impassable.   A tree might stand,

or fall, laden, across the tracks.

                                                          

So, I’m sitting here remembering, by turns,

the sorrows of the ones who told me so,

as they waited to drag me out of the ditch

before I’d even set off,  

                                          and the kindness

of the ones who say, "Snow falls, and it melts,

and in any case, a tree can become logs,

a landslide can be shovelled away." 

With love from Liz xx

I Prepare For Christmas

Last week, rather than going late night Christmas shopping, I went to watch my son play hockey.  He has played ever since he was allowed to give up rugby, but before Tuesday last, I'd not made it to a game.  

To reach the pitch at Lilleshall National Sports Centre I had to walk along a dimly-lit path.  It was the irregular, precise percussion of ball on hockey stick, rather than a guiding light, which told me I was heading in the right direction.  This sound is slightly higher, tenser, more intact somehow, than the sound of croquet ball on mallet, or cricket ball on bat. 

When I joined the other three spectators on the sidelines, I was amazed. Under the brightness of the floodlights, 22 young men zipped around a perfect emerald surface, aiming passes which arrived at their intended destination.  The speed the ball traveled was unbelievable, and occasionally painful.  They took injuries in the stomach, on the back, all with little complaint.

These days, hockey pitches are made from synthetic turf.  The one at Lilleshall, as you'd expect, is of international standard.  It looks immaculate - level, smooth, flawless.  Nothing like the pitches I learnt on when I attended South Hampstead High School in north London.  This was a land-locked school with very little outside space: we managed one-and-a-half netball courts, but for hockey were transported in a navy blue minibus to Regent's Park.

The best thing about the hockey pitches at Regent's Park was the view of the mountain goats who'd occasionally appear on rocky outcrops visible above London Zoo's fencing.  I think we sometimes saw camels too, but I might be making this up.  In all the years I traveled to those leaden, lumpy pitches, I didn't play a single full game of hockey.  We'd be sent to run up and down, round and round; we'd practise passing - balls flying off at angles; we'd bully off, dribble around obstacles; we'd play multiple games, in parallel, across the width of the pitch.  I never got the hang of the rules, and now the rules have changed.  There is no bullying off.  Corners aren't corners, nor are they taken from the corners.  The fiberglass sticks can be raised above waist-height, as long as this is done safely.

Watching my son bathed in light, strong, confident, shouting encouragement to his team from full back, I felt all a mother could hope to feel about her son.  There he was, in the full flow of his gifts: youth, strength, vitality - masterful, and loved beyond measure.  

I Embrace A Plank

Meet Plankie.  This is  a head and shoulders shot, but he extends down quite a long way.  Plankie was my son J's childhood creation and friend and we came across him again this afternoon when his big brother, G, needed something longer than a ruler.  I gave him a long overdue hug.

Seeing Plankie again made me come over all warm.  Warmth was a feeling I also experienced at The Land Of Lost Content in Craven Arms last Saturday.  This museum is dedicated - unashamedly, extravagantly and recklessly - to nostalgia, much of it tat but none of it worthless.  I recommend that if you visit you go, as I did, with a close friend of similar age with whom you feel able to utter, without embarrassment, over and over again, "Oh, I remember this / that / those!" whether you're referring to stuffed budgies in cages, electric typewriters, Donny Osmond mannequins or Zoom lollies.

J's determination to love Plankie against the odds for all these years moves me.  Back when Plankie was new, he made a rigid bedfellow and a reluctant traveller.  Planks, even ones with faces, don't easily sit upright in cars.  Much of the content in the LOLC is also rigid, yellow and slightly off-centre, but my companion and I were determined to embrace the unlikely experience of it all, and if you get the chance, you must go (though it's closed in December and January).

Although older and a good deal taller than Plankie now, J's affection for him is still clear.  I like this loyalty to the absurd, to fun, to the apparently worthless.  I will always relish ability of those who can find joy in anything - who can draw a lopsided smile onto any day of the week.

http://www.lolc.org.uk/

I Keep The Score

No one was more surprised than me when I won 4-1 at badminton today.  Admittedly, for three of the games, J only used backhand shots.  This was because Malcolm from the Tuesday club set this for him as homework.  This Malcolm-imposed limitation gave me a considerable advantage, one I exploited by placing shots to J's forehand.  Long-gone are the days when I held back from using the full panoply of tactics learned over 40 years at the net.  At 6'3", J doesn't need any favours from me.

Usually our scores creep up fairly evenly.  1-0, 2-0, 2-1, 2-2, 2-3, etc.  When we get into the higher numbers, I add an extra challenge to our game by turning some of our scores into dates.  18-15, for example, is the date of the Battle of Waterloo.  Or, as I've recently discovered, the date of publication of the first geological map. 12-15, Magna Carta, is topical in this its 800th anniversary year, as is 14-15, Agincourt.  18-12 is our favourite score: "Overture," we chorus whenever it occurs.  "Battle of Borodino," I sometimes add.  We are too evenly matched to have scored the Battle of Trafalgar (18-05), but today, thanks to Malcolm, we hit a new range of dates in addition to old favourites.  Here are some of them:

10-16 - King Cnut begins his reign
12-04 - Capture of Constantinople by the 4th Crusaders
13-07 - Wm Tell supposedly shoots the apple off his son's head  (another chance to shout, "Overture!")
16-19 - First Thanksgiving, Virginia
19-15 - Sinking of the Lusitania
20-12 - 'lympics

I Receive Unlimited Texts

Apparently, I have the capacity to send unlimited texts on my phone contract.  This, in fact, means that I can send 3,000 free texts per month to my 3,000 closest friends, or 3,000 texts to my only friend.  Anything else would involved keeping count, complicated maths and possibly involve me in exceeding my unlimited limit.  If there is one thing I am determined not to do, it is to incur extra charges.

Having said all that, I received two unlimited texts yesterday whilst I was in Glasgow visiting the School of Art with my son. They made me smile in broad daylight.  I know they were unlimited texts because until my sons are 18 they aren't allowed to manage their phone contracts, so I have 3 phones in my name, giving me a potential limit of 9,000 free unlimited expensive texts per month.

The reason that these two texts felt unlimited was that they gave me unlimited pleasure.  Never in an unlimited month of free Sundays could I have imagined I would receive the following messages:

Can you also bring my fur and my hat     and
We are underneath Donald Dewar

I Invent A Term

Back on the municipal court in the growing dusk before the still surprisingly early GMT sunset, J and I were practising Ball and using Ball terminology.  J achieved several Swishes from far out, one preceded by a Rainbow - a perfect arc of a shot.

"That was a Brick," J informed me, as my shot ricocheted directly back into my hands having hit the rim square on.  

"This terminology, " I said, "is why Ball is cooler than netball."   

"And other reasons."  J lobbed the ball.  It bounced off the backboard, onto the rim and out. 

"Wooden Cow," he stated.

"Wooden Cow ...?" I asked.

"Nah. Wouldn't Count.  Wouldn't count in netball because there'd be no backboard." 

Fifteen minutes later, one of my shots bounced off the backboard, onto the rim and out.

"Wooden Cow,"  I said.

"Yup, Mum - one of them."

I Collect A Commendation

Whilst I was with Threesome on the Edinburgh Fringe in August, performing in Sweet Thunder, A Show in Three Layers, I heard that I had been highly commended.  I found this out at about 11pm, and although I was in my room in my pyjamas, I rushed downstairs and surprised my cousin with a hug.

The mission of the Bridport Prize is to "encourage emerging writers and promote literary excellence through its competition structure."  Well, it's succeeded in encouraging me.  My poem, Michelangelo's David, was chosen from over 7000 entries from 78 countries to be highly commended by this year's judge, Roger McGough.  It even beat the other two poems I had entered.  The Lucas clan, family of my longest-serving friend, says that I am now eligible to use the strap-line Internationally Acclaimed Poet on my website.

Being recognised as a poet is as essential to me these days as being recognised as a mother -  it's no coincidence that I write more about motherhood than any other subject.  It took me years to come out as a poet - I remember very clearly when I was about 8 showing my family a poem I'd dashed off, and declaring that this was to be my life's work.  I don't think I spoke loudly enough.  There followed rejections by the school magazine and decades in the poetic wilderness, until 2011 when I won the Roy Fisher Prize.

Poetry competitions have been kind to me since then, enabling me to put myself in a position to be recognised and to recognise myself.  Of course, I've entered quite a few without winning anything, but that simply makes success, when it comes, all the sweeter.

My longest-serving friend's mother was my companion at the prize-giving last Saturday.  Her support for my endeavours has involved her in lengthy conversations over piles of paper and cups of tea, intrepid train journeys via South West Trains and Arriva Trains Wales, and lost luggage, so she was my first choice of guest for the big occasion.  When I went up on the stage at Bridport Arts Centre last Saturday afternoon to shake the mighty Roger's hand, he asked me, with a twinkle in his eye, how my Italian is getting on. 

Michelangelo's David

I didn’t plan for this, queueing with my sons,

i miei figli, for the Galleria dell’Accademia

to see Michelangelo’s David.

We’re in Florence, Firenze, Italy, Italia.

I’ve brought no food, no drink, no pack of cards,

niente, not even an Italian phrasebook.

Half an hour and just ten feet along it’s:

‘Whose idea was this?’ and the danger of feeling

this queue’s a mistake we needn’t have started.

But, given time, we become more fluent,

take it in turns to drift in and out to buy focaccia,

pizza, tre gelati, un cappuccino, limonata, acqua,

discover we’ve learnt these words without trying.

It turns out this is why we are waiting:

for loose-limbed time leaning on walls,

leaning on each other, playing with words,

playing with our hair, making it up as we go along.

We’re unsure of the scope but discover that love

can be translated into time in any language.

David’s the perfect excuse for being here

in Florence in the sun on a Wednesday in April -

for trying out being together in Italian.

I miei figli, i miei cari figli, my beloved sons:

this is, after all, my point. Passing time with you

is all, tutto, enough, basta. And look, guarda!

Even our shadows are smiling.