1. I wonder if I’d get such joy from a clean kitchen if it was so neat and shiny all the time or whether it’s the novelty of the situation that excites me so much.
2. Katherine visits for a cup of tea and Joe shows off his smile. It’s now available on demand and not just when his facial muscle twitch at the right time.
3. The soft white root pushing through the green mung beans’ swollen shells.
1. Listening to The Lucksmiths for the first time in a long time is the aural equivalent of slipping into a warm bath.
2. The wallpaper comes away in long strips; it’s addictive like peeling protective plastic coatings off screens … or picking scabs. Mmm, picking scabs.
3. An offhanded comment quickly becomes a catchphrase for the evening, a riff we return to again and again. Like Sideshow Bob stepping on rakes, it gets funnier each time.
1. We push the plates and cutlery aside and spread out the paper. We scribble as we talk excitedly and by the end of the meal, we have a plan.
2. We know we’ve hit a certain age, a certain sensibility, when we stare at a shower cubicle in Homebase with such adoration.
3. The cats and I stomp around in the last of the snow, heading into the woods. By the time we turn back, we hear John splitting wood so take a detour – the cats through the holly tree, me up the slippery slope around it – to join him.
1. The cats glow in the soft sunlight. The melting snow is still too cold for their paws but they sit on the dry fence and watch me split logs. For cats that are scared of everything, they’re strangely fearless when I’m flinging an axe at wood.
2. The (flat)bread is perfect – startling white inside a golden shell. As always, I’m surprised by the alchemy that has taken place in the last quarter of an hour: from powder to goop to light sponge.
3. The snow around here has all but melted off the roads but at Olli’s house, the wide road is still evenly white. We find it rough on the way in but later, on the way home, it’s verging on slippery – enough to let us slide around but not enough to feel out of control (the perfect amount of fun/danger for boring 30-somethings like us). We dance and moonwalk in the dark silence.
1. I move from room to room opening the curtains to let in the day. My favourites are the ones in the dining room because they whoosh dramatically.
2. The wood splits perfectly down the middle and by coincidence, the logs I’ve chosen stack neatly in the box. Despite the snow on the ground and on the wood itself, I’m sweating by the time I’ve carried the box up the stairs into the house and I’m reminded of an article I read a few months ago, about how wood should heat you three times: once with the exertion of felling the tree, once with the exertion of splitting it, and then finally when it’s on the stove.
3. I plop a heavy bubble of cranberry & cinnamon bath foam into the water. The torus is blood red and looks stunning but frighteningly visceral. I store the image in my mental “if I ever need gory special effects for a homemade horror movie” file.
© 2024 Louisa Parry