The Untimely Return of Mrs Fillyjonk

In my last post I misjudged the power of Mrs Fillyjonk's prophecy.

We got a phonecall yesterday to inform us that, despite telling us that the flat in Bevendean was ours to rent, giving us the forms, and most importantly, making us put £300 deposit down on it, the agents had given it to someone else. Fuckers. So our little dream place has vanished as quickly as it came.

Oh Mrs Fillyjonk. I bow down to your wisdom, and worship at the altar of disaster!

The Fillyjonk Who Believed in Disasters

It was a mild and motionless summer day, exactly right for washing carpets. Slow and sleepy swells came rolling in to help her with the rinsing, and around her red cap a few bumblebees were humming: they took her for a flower.

Don't you pretend, the Fillyjonk thought grimly. I know how things are. Everything's always peaceful like this just before a disaster...


Bob and I have been taking it in turns to read to each other. He's been reading me Tales From Moomin Valley; I've been reading him Enemy of God. His book is about strange creatures that live on the outskirts of the imagination; mine is full of bloodthirsty Christian saints and people getting bits of them chopped off in horrific ways. It seems fitting somehow, a mutual exchange of what we each crave a bit of.

Last night he read me The Fillyjonk Who Believed in Disasters. I cried at the end (quietly, into his jumper), partly because it's brilliant, and partly because it reminded me of, well, me. It's good when that happens - you can spend hours, weeks, years, driving yourself crazy trying to find the key to understanding something about yourself and your life. Then a little story comes along and you go That's it. There I am.

If you can, I think you should read this story by Tove Janssen; it's terribly clever and very beautiful. To crudely summarise: a fillyjonk (Mrs Fillyjonk) is seized with a nameless fear, a sense of approaching disaster she can do nothing about. Then, when a real calamity strikes, it has unexpected consequences...

Bob and I are moving in together. We are moving to a weird house in a weird place. It's called Bevendean. It sits on the side of a hill and is surrounded by badgers, foxes and men shouting at their dogs. Though I am nervous about such a move, I am not half as nervous as I've been for the last year, knowing that the move has to be made, but not knowing how or where or if. So I've clung to my flat like a lifeboat on a very windy sea, and weathered all its quirks (windows being blown out), eccentricities (rainwater cascading through roof) and overall quaintness (nutter in basement who nicked my Daniel Johnston cd). But now it's time to let go.



I can take my teacups with me. And my birdcages and spotty dresses too. Unlike the fillyjonk (fingers crossed), all my belongings do not have to go swirling up to heaven, carried up in a tornado. But you never know.

I'm not sure about the rubbish piled up in the backyard at this new place. I'm not sure about the 'funky' decor. I'm certainly not sure about Bob's new running joke ("You're Bev, I'm Dean!"). But I am sure I've absolutely made the right decision, and that we will be happy there. And that once a 'disaster' has finally arrived, sometimes it's a lot easier to deal with.

I'm tired of waiting for the next tornado to rip through my world, and of the beating in my chest that comes with it. Of never feeling like I can be happy because, if I let myself, something awful is sure to happen. I can clatter my teacups and buy a new teapot, but I know the storms outside that are pounding to get in. They're big, and, like you, I am very, very small.

But, fuck it, I'm not going to wait any longer for the winds to carry me off. I'm upping sticks and moving out, to a magnificent and weird place, to somewhere new. I am certain Mrs Fillyjonk will approve.

...

Yes, I thought I could lure you in with my karate-chopping nun picture; it never fails. Of course, this was a deliberate ploy - my thinking is that by showing you a picture from my new Nuns Having Fun calendar, somehow it'll make up to my more avid readers for the fact that I haven't written in over two weeks.

Secondly, I'm doing what I do every few months - and trying to convince readers that I'm not just some morbidly obsessed, writer-y-type, always banging on about her mother dying and how life is full of loss and disappointment and mediocre television game shows such as Deal-Or-No-Deal (though one day I'll share with you the esoteric side of D-O-N-D).

No. I'm also a fun-loving, light-hearted kind of gal, who can take pictures of quirky things around her flat and share them with you, dear reader, and therefore is always capable of more than just long blog posts full of beauty and woe. So here's a picture of some sweets. Aren't they lovely? Straight from the mouth of God. Well, Elephant and Castle, to be precise.



Jesus Sweets. Mmm, Strawberries and Cream. Oh, ok, I've just spotted the words 'mourn' and 'burden' in there, so... ok, here's a picture of a Basset hound instead. This is a dog I hope to one day own (after I have all my other dogs), and whom I aspire even more, in old age, to becoming like. Yes, it sounds fucking weird, I know, but I want nothing more than to become like a Bassett hound. Ohh, the saggy nobility of it.

Thursday evening

I've been grateful, of late, to notice small slivers of daylight still hanging in the air as I walk up Church Road, even though the clock has already struck five thirty. These tiny shards of optimism, breaking through the winter chill, warm me, and offset the heavy feeling I've had of late, the feeling of dark birds clustering at every street corner, following me home.

I can't quite separate out these last months into any tangible order; they've been a peculiar mixture of sadness, hope and bewilderment. These last few weeks have been no different, and I'm driven by the feeling that some things in my life are finally coming together, whilst the rest of it unravels.

After a drought of money and work for the last year or so, a couple of weeks ago, I suddenly found myself standing in an avalanche of decorating work and some writing work too. I could finally allow my dreams of a trip to Andalucia to surface again, as well as my vision of spending money on a new pair of jeans, a pair that I actually like (and isn't from some knock-down store or passed onto me by a charitable sister: wrong size, full of holes).

But I've not quite been right since that last trip home to Wales in January. The strain and enormity of my experience there cast a strange shadow over everything when I returned to Brighton, leaving me disorientated on buses, forgetting where I was headed to, my head spinning in all directions as I walked past cafes or spoke on the phone. A flooding in my heart, a weirdness afterwards, a feeling that my consciousness was leaving me in some way.

I realised the other day that this wasn't simply a case of me being a bit overwhelmed, but actually something very physical was up. For the last four months this strange feeling in my chest and my mind, a swamping of my senses and a disturbing feeling in my body has been coming and going, depending on the time of the month and how tired I am. Due to everything else that's been going on, I'd just seen it as another wave in the sea of unsettling experience, and got on with it. But over the last few days it's worsened, and I've had to face some facts.

So, following a conversation with my sister, who is utterly convinced that I'm epileptic, since my symptoms match hers exactly (she is epileptic) I've been back to the doctor for referrals to a neurologist and cardiologist. I wouldn't surprise me if it was epilepsy either, but it also wouldn't be a shock if it was just another form of panic attacks, frequent and savage.

The bottom line is, I have to take it easy, easy within a sudden life change of being incredibly busy. How ironic. At a time when I need to avoid computer screens and caffeine, I find myself having to spend days writing book reviews. When I need to rest and avoid stress, I'm wobbling up a ladder working to deadline, with strong paint fumes swilling in my brain. But I'm determined to go softly. Whatever it is that's going on with me, that much I know.

So I'm off to curl up in bed with a book, feel the night dragging in the sky outside my bedroom window. I'm not bothered if there aren't any stars out tonight. I just want a clear, fresh morning tomorrow, light and breezy, filling up my step and my lungs with graceful ease.