I Write In Red

Red for the strawberries, ripening on my allotment, sweet brightness against straw. Red for the runner bean flowers. Red for the radishes huddled up close. Red, just about, for the rhubarb. Red for my face after Saturday on my allotment - for the heat and exertion. Red for the ants I disturbed, and avoided. Red for hope for the tiny green baby tomato I spotted - the first of this season. 

Red for Man Utd, club of the moment, team of my colleague and friend, Tim. Red for our endless football banter. Red for the ribbons on the FA cup. Red for the crowd. Red for the fans heard rowdy and loud around Shrewsbury on Saturday evening. Red for painting the town. Red for my glass of wine. Red for my Arsenal scarf, hanging limp but avenged. Red for the roar of football. Red for its disappointments, red for the joys. 

I Integrate Some Things...

... more specifically, my work role. I was enabled to do this at a conference at the University of Central Lancashire this week. Understanding came to me as it always does: relationally, emotionally, experientially; and specifically in the company of two colleagues from other universities.

A lot has happened since 2007 when I met Jill and Chris at the first Authenticity to Action conference in Grange-over-Sands. There I heard about, and signed up to, DUCIE, a support network for Developers of User and Carer Involvement in higher Education. DUCIE (mostly Jill and Chris) ran regular meetings for mutual support roughly twice a year. In the old days, we travelled to each others' universities. More recently, meetings have been online, so the sense of connectedness on seeing people in person in Preston was heightened. 

The Service User and Carer Participation role has held a unique, and loosely defined, place in universities. Whenever DUCIE's met, we've compared notes on work which is pioneering. We've always found common ground. Those conversations have been a source of comfort, consolation, and confidence, particularly when I've felt isolated and out of my depth.

Among all the other aspects of my lecturer role (teaching, marking, writing, tutoring, interviewing, degree management...) participation development work has been my driving passion. It relates to my commitment to ensuring people with lived experience of health and social care services have an equal say in how future professionals are educated: what students of social work, in particular, learn and how they learn it. 

Participation has become my specialist subject but, though I've written book chapters about it, I often struggle to articulate what it is. It's a way of being though it's shown in ways of doing. Participation in higher education is both institutionalised (a requirement of professional bodies like the Nursing and Midwifery Council) and runs counter to much of academic culture. It subverts hierarchies of knowledge and power which place the value of empiricism (social science-y stuff) above phenomenology (what we feel we have experienced - our stories of what it was like). DUCIE members have all met with considerable resistance. Being in the company of those who understand this, and have experienced it over a long period of time, felt like a homecoming.

Erik Ericson's stage theory tells us that the final task of our psychosocial development is to manage the tension between despair and ego identity that comes in the final chapter of our lives - in other words, to look back and make sense of what we've been up to. He says this starts around age 65 (he was going by old-style male retirement age, I suppose). Whatever. This theory came to mind during those 48 hours in Preston as I looked back on my work in the company of Jill and Chris - as we shared memories, laughter, sorrows, failures, successes. They enabled me to a deeper realisation of what I've been doing, and to a sense of wholeness in relation to my work's varied adventures. 

The thought-feeling I took home with me from Preston is this: I've been part of something.

Me in 2011, looking at my audience, which included Jill, Chris, and other participation workers. Photo by Jill. She shared it on the big conference screen during a presentation on Thursday, which was a surprise, a smiley one.

I Burble On About Running / Butter

The best thing, among the other best things, about being a late starter is that I don’t have a history of running times, triumphs or disasters - completing my second ever timed 10K yesterday, all I had to compare myself with was the first one. As it wasn’t 30 degrees this time, and most of the hills were in a downwards direction, I ran faster. More importantly, I ran with J. - my running friend. I’ve never had a running friend before, at least, not one with whom I’ve actually gone running regularly, twice a week, chatting. 

My other running friends have become breakfast friends. I with D. on Saturday discussing butter as we ate eggs on toast - our conversation was something along the lines of everything being improved by it: everything food, D. clarified (the sentiment, not the butter). With D’s confident endorsement of something I’ve always known and discussed at length with my longest-serving friend, I enjoyed my toast even more. 

The thing is, I got excited earlier in the week by an email. It was marketing from Candlestick Press, famous for its commitment to publishing poetry in the form of ‘not greetings cards’. They’ve published ‘Ten Poems About Bikes, Dogs, Breakfast’, about XYZ. The email was advertising their latest pamphlet. ‘At last,’ I thought ‘Ten Poems About Butter’.

After yesterday’s 10K in which I clocked a lifetime personal best, J., a skilled listener, suggested hot chocolate. As we neared the order point, I asked ‘Are you going to have cream and a flake?’ I asked the question more in the style of, ‘I couldn’t possibly justify having cream and a flake, could I, given that I’ve just been making observations about my menopausal tummy?’ Cream is a couple of levels above butter on my list of life’s indulgences - not everything is improved by cream, but a few things you wouldn’t want to put butter on are. J. heard what I was really asking - something along the lines of ‘I’d really like cream and a flake but I’m not sure I’m allowed.’ ‘Of course,’ J. answered, ‘and marshmallows,’ as if it were the most natural thing in the world.

When I re-read the Candlestick email later on yesterday, poised to order a full fat poetry pamphlet, I read more carefully this time, ‘Ten Poems About Butterflies.’ Well, at least the landscape is clear for my own work. I fancy writing my way through a Butter Phase.

I Deter Slugs

Sometimes, a conversation has the effect of a tin opener - one of those old-style ones which involves puncturing the can with a sharp blade, running it round the lid without the assistance of wheels or cogs. This type of opener leaves ragged edges, and a sense of jeopardy. I wonder if that is how my Longest-Serving Friend's courgette plants felt after being eaten by slugs overnight last Thursday - it certainly left her feeling ragged, so as I was going to stay for the weekend, I took wine and flowers.

These thoughts - the being opened up by a conversation and the destructive potential of slugs - came together as I planted baby broad bean plants on my allotment this morning. They are not directly comparable situations, and yet something about that conversation came back to me as I thought about holes, and how to protect the broad bean plants from slugs. 

I don't know if it was the effect of either the wine or the flowers, but last weekend my Longest-Serving Friend found the motivation to try again with courgettes, and had the idea of cutting the bottoms out of flower pots to use as shields around the next lot of plants. We imagined the slugs trying to gain purchase, perhaps hurling themselves at the plants, but slipping down the plastic sloping pot sides. Ha!

The conversation I had, the one that's making me think of tin openers, happened ages ago, but it's stuck with me as a painful unkindness. It was about the holes in me and how they are irreparable. In therapy, I learned to use the metaphor of woundedness about these holes, and also learned, with skilful help, how to take care of myself. 

Not wanting to use slug pellets to deter slugs (bad for birds, bad for hedgehogs) I followed my Longest-Serving Friend's example today and made collars out of plastic cups to shield the broad bean plants I've been growing from seed. I cut out the bases, and I made sure to leave a ragged edge. Something about doing this - about being outside on my allotment, pottering about in the sunshine, planting broad beans, and trying to protect them, helped me feel complete.

I Womansplain My (10th Birthday) Blog

This blog is ten years old today - happy birthday, dear I Buy a New Washer! Birthdays, I've found, are a time for looking backwards (what was I thinking?) and forwards (help!) and then for celebrating (woohoo!).

On 18th Feb 2014 I published this: 'I Buy A New Washer - Day One'. Long-serving readers know that I intended it to be the title of that first post, not the whole blog. I was motivated to write it having changed a tap washer for the first time - a moderate act of independence about which I felt proud. The title has proved misleading and led to me being introduced as a plumbing expert, with a particular interest in washing machines, at a poetry reading. My protests at this generous introduction were further misinterpreted as modesty. 

Fortunately, others have been on hand to expose the lack of depth in my plumbing knowledge, often communicating in comments at the bottom of blog posts. This one from Adam, for example: "Plumbing," he explains patiently, after viewing 'I Worry About Plumbing', and possibly becoming worried himself, "refers to the system of pipes, fixtures, and other apparatuses used for water supply and drainage in buildings and structures. Plumbing is essential for bringing clean water into homes and removing wastewater." And then, as if suggesting a plausible career alternative for someone so evidently in need of this entry level of explanation, Adam adds: "Sell your old cars to Cash for Cars and get instant dollars." 

Not all post are about moderate acts of DIY. The one that has received the most views (over 1700) is  'I Puzzle Over Significance'. It's about a jigsaw puzzle and Mahler - maybe there's a plumbing / jigsaw puzzle intersection it accidentally tapped into. Total views amount to 213,261: 730 views per blog on average. However, I doubt (judging from Adam's ignoring the main subjects of 'I Worry About Plumbing') that views are equivalent to reads. By way of comparison, the least read post (97 views) is 'I Microwave A Curry' - go figure. 

Looking forwards, when I press the orange publish button, this will be my 292nd post. There are several more than that sitting in draft folders, unfinished: 'I Poke My Eye', 'I Work In Wrexham', 'I Recover My Milk Frother', 'I Shrink My Trousers'. Looking forwards, I intend to leave these unpublished but I aim to be able to write 'I Snorkel With Penguins' before the twenty year blog birthday celebrations. 

Having looked backwards and forwards, now's the time for the birthday celebrations. The blog dressed up in its best party clothes is the book version, published by Mark Time in 2020; the playful illustrations by John Rae were an inspired addition (thank you Ross Donlon for making the suggestion). If you'd like to send a birthday card to I Buy A New Washer, please add to the reviews on goodreads. If you'd like to play pass the parcel with I Buy A New Washer (with a guaranteed unwrapping of the central prize), put on your favourite music and then order a copy for a birthday-bargain price of £5 plus postage. 

And this birthday will end, as all good birthdays do, with thank you's. Thanks to those who've supported me with the gifts of readership, sharing, encouragement, suggestions, book purchase, comments on the blog itself and on Facebook. Thanks for sticking with it for one read, or for all 292. All of these gifts help me to feel more connected to you, to the written word, and, ultimately, to myself.

For the bargain-birthday-book offer, email me liz.lefroy@btinternet.com (offer lasts for the next 10 days only, plus one for the leap year - till 1st March 2024).

I Allot My Time

In September 2022, I applied for an allotment about half a mile along the river, and in a bit. There was a lockdown flurry of interest in growing things, so I was surprised to get an email a couple of weeks ago saying I'd reached the top of the waiting list. Here I sit, typing this, the key to the padlock for the shed of quarter plot no. 78a burning a hole in my pocket. 

An allotment is a piece of land on which to grow fruit and vegetables for private consumption. A full plot is 10 poles, or perches, long. It's an ancient measure. 78a is about half the size of half a doubles tennis court. Having been allotted an allotment I must, to avoid warning letters and then eviction, allot time to keeping it tidy and cultivated.

Here's the plot so far: I've taken the shed door off its hinges, sawn a little from the bottom so that it opens more easily, screwed it back. I've uncovered treasures: fork, spade, two saws (luckily), trowel, hoe, long-handled shears, broad bean seeds, slug pellets, seed trays, bamboo canes, a white plastic chair and several lengths of twine. I've thrown out some things that the mice and damp had got to. I've had a new piece of glass cut to size, and fixed the broken pane of the greenhouse. I've dug over the strawberry bed, spacing 15 plants more evenly, in the interests of their equal opportunities. After all that, I sat eating my lunch in the sunny, sheltered nook between shed and greenhouse, listening to birdsong. 

A few years ago, I would've felt daunted by the broken pane of glass, the jamming shed door, the tangled strawberry plants, but minor acts of DIY and gardening practice on my rooftop and in other people's gardens have given me a have-a-go confidence. 

Allotment 78a. It has all the potential, all the restraint of a sonnet. For now, I'm preparing the square of ground, and in spring, I will plant rows of potatoes, courgettes, runner beans, lettuce, tomatoes, and onions.  As the sun warms and the rain falls, they will grow into lines, with breaks at the paths, reveal to me a rhyme scheme as yet to be invented, and come to a full stop at the crown of rhubarb.

I Reframe the New Year

I re-started 2024 today. But it's already 12 days in, you may well observe. And so it is.

I started 2024 on schedule, and in London too, thanks to my sons' present of tickets for a family trip to My Neighbour Totoro on New Year's Eve afternoon. It was a spectacularly wonderful, life-affirming production. After the show, I checked my phone - my goddaughter had sent me a message letting me know that  Day 1 of Adriene's 30 Days of Yoga 2024 would start on New Year's Day. I made my resolution - I enjoy Adriene's videos, and I've got out of the habit of bending and balancing. 

The New Year's Eve fun continued when we went to Brasserie Zedel for dinner, as close an experience of Paris as you can get near to Piccadilly Circus. The young people went off to their various celebrations and my Longest-Serving Friend and I wandered through London's lights which were, it has to be said, several cuts above Shrewsbury's, and made sure bedtime was well before midnight. Next morning, we got up and did the Burgess Parkrun. That same New Year's evening, heading back home, my eldest son and his girlfriend shared news of their engagement which came about in the rock room of the Natural History Museum. Such an excellent arrangement of place, timing, metaphor, and materials. Such hopeful, shiny news.

Of course, going back to work on 2nd January has a habit of applying the brakes to New Year momentum. But in the not-work part of my life, I somehow, between all the loveliness of actual New Year and the getting into the business of a day-by-day new year, mislaid resolution. Resolution is (I hardly need to mention) a word which suggests resolve. And the word resolve suggests 'to decide firmly on a course of action' (Google English Dictionary). None of these (decide, firmly, course, action) were thoughts I could lay hold of in those following January days; it's been more a case of unresolve: indecision, apathy, physical and mental wobbliness. 

It was poetry that resolved me. It was poetry in community, and wise, compassionate, playful, poetry at that. At Shrewsbury Poetry, we were lucky enough to host Philip Gross and Steve Griffiths for our first get together of the new year yesterday evening. Among our online poetry community, and among open mic poems which resonated and flowed with the thoughts and feelings emerging, Philip and Steve held a conversation. As with all remarkable conversations, this one shifted something for me. 

If I were to pin the shift down to something, I'd pin it down to this. While Philip was reading his poem 'Of Breath (Thirteen Angels)' I visualised my lungs for the first time as wings ("don't look for it outside") unfurling with each breath. The poem came to me as a winged messenger through the black and white memories of my lungs, x-rayed when I was a child for damage after pneumonia. I could see myself now in full technicolor, complete with "pink and glistening cavities" breathing in oxygen, breathing in life, readying for the brief flight necessary to enter each moment, and this new year. 

If I were to pin it down to something, this re-framing, it would be to this: I got up this morning, dusted off my yoga mat, sat cross-legged and breathed. And this breath has given me a sense of a voice which can "step to the body's window ledge and, briefly, fly".

Happy new year to you, dear reader. Keep breathing.