Dream House

My Mum died a few months ago and I am still trying to make sense of it- she was a whirlwind and one of the most complicated people I have ever met, but her aliveness was very apparent, she was sort of robust and angry and had an appreciation for the absurd that meant talking to her could elicit all kinds of strange emotions. That all of that has disappeared is confusing to say the least.

Yesterday I watched Grayson Perry’s Dream House and it made me cry like a big baby. The story behind the project is all about the trajectory of a fictional Essex woman’s life, whose house, incidentally, is 10 minutes drive away from where my Mum lived in real life. The owner of the dream house Julie was inspired by the life of ordinary Essex women, who have battled through failed relationships, infidelity and childbirth.

Grayson could pretty much be talking about my Mum, Maggie- a nurse who gave her life to other people, often with little in return. The inside of Julie’s house is decorated with tapestries depicting moments of her life- she was an outgoing, colourful girl who had her heart broken and eventually died by getting run over by a pizza delivery bike in Colchester, the town I went to school and college in and where my daughter was born.

Having only very recently cleared out my Mum’s house, bagging up her clothes, throwing away most of her belongings and finding photographs of her life that I have never seen before, the idea of biography and how it relates to personal space are very much in my mind. Watching Dream House had a real effect on me, it is a shrine that has been built to the resilience of women, reminiscent of the Taj Mahal in both style and intent.

Grayson Perry has said that he has a difficult relationship with his mother, and I would be lying if I said I didn’t. He built the house to try and fix this, as if Julie was the woman he wishes his mother had been. At the time of her death Julie was happy, having found love with the man who, in the story, was the one to build her the house. It is ornate and beautiful, decorated with tiles that have a kind of Sheela na gig figure on them.

Whether my own Mum was happy at the end is an unknown to me, she seemed to be- but as I say, she was a very complex lady. What I do know is that she had an ordinary life, with highs and lows. Her capacity for love and joy was enormous, although she didn’t always connect with that part of herself. Perhaps that is the best that anyone can hope for- a good life is full of curiosity, wherever that takes you.

As I have said about a million times since my Mum died- the death seems like the easy part. Personally, my grief has centred around whether her life was lived in the right context, whether she was happy and if she made good choices. Sometimes things happened that weren’t her choice, but she did her best at trying to understand- because she was a human being. Also, she was never boring, which is very important- Mum never ever lost her sense of humour.

Within grief comes the urge for a narrative, I have been trying to write and rewrite in my mind exactly what has happened- throughout Mum’s life and mine. In some strange way this house has become part of that story, and seems almost to have been built for me. In the background is the Estuary near to where my Mum grew up, and also close to where we had her funeral.

Grayson Perry said that he had built his house for all the women from Essex, to celebrate their struggles, and this touched me enormously. It seems to me that it is a space for acceptance and reconciliation, which is the ultimate goal of grief I think. I have some way to go with all that, I am still sad and confused but I know that things will get better, because I am surrounded by love, and that is the real answer to everything.

The Eternal Round

In December 2004 I was living in a converted cotton factory on Shacklewell Lane. I was drunk mostly and when I wasn’t drunk I was working in a job that I hated beyond measure, doing market research for an IT magazine that no one wanted. I was drunk, unable to change my situation, dissatisfied and aimless- with a vague notion that I was a bit like someone from a F. Scott Fitzgerald novel yet much less interesting. Quite frankly, I was bored- the kind of gnawing boredom that permeates everything. I would cry when I watched musicals and on one particularly terrible comedown felt like killing myself while watching an aeroplane fly through the dawn.

Modern malaise. So what? The Tsunami passed me by the same way September 11th did, I had no grip on the world around me. I saw the images and they went through me, I couldn’t connect with it- depression is a different kind of horror. Living in a permanent state of crisis makes it hard to be empathetic, my immediate life was far enough away. 

 It was in this state that I was watching TV one morning, and saw a programme that was asking different religious leaders what meaning the Tsunami had, how could we make sense of it? They started with some Bishop talking about how we can see it as an opportunity to love each other more, to help out neighbours in times of hardship. Another guy came on to talk about perspective. One by one these big shots came on, telling us how to feel. I watched with one eye, the other in my cornflakes, until one particular man spoke. He was a Buddhist and when the presenter asked him the question he just said:

 ‘None. The events are entirely meaningless.’

These words changed my life. And it wasn’t so much the content, because I’d read all that- we all do, when we’re 15. It was the way he said it, and the contrast between the other answers and his. It was the calm in his voice, the lack of posturing and his matter of factness that got me. The events are entirely meaningless. 

I started going to the Buddhist Centre in Holloway Road to do a course on Buddhism and to take part in group meditation. It was OK, not my thing really- a lot of the people there were pretty annoying if I’m honest, but it was a shift. I learned about the Eternal Round and saw my situation more clearly that I had before. I slowly gave up drinking and started to look for people who didn’t rely on booze to become who they thought they were. A few years before I had made a song with a friend that I thought was pure and good so I went to a payphone and called him, with the wind rustling the trees.

Well I hadn’t seen Danny for a long time but we decided to try and make some more songs. He was getting better too and this common ground was a tenet for us as well as a difficulty, but what came out of the story was beautiful Flora. Our daughter made me a nicer person, more real and connected than ever before. Flo and I have lived together for nearly nine years and she has taught me how love works, that I don’t live in a film or a book but in my own meaningless life- which is so much more interesting than either of those could ever be. 

Next Gen Thread Memes

I made these after reading a very snarky Facebook thread about the Next Generation Poets. All those commenting were poets themselves and not at all bitter in any way. 

women and their secrets

i found this picture of me breastfeeding in the hospital- such a strange time. i think this was probably the loneliest i've ever been. no one tells you how difficult it's going to be. well, anyway- i think this picture is art actually- for lots of reasons. look how hard i'm trying. i didn't know what was happening- i was entirely out of my body. people think sad stories are unacceptable in some way- perhaps it has to do with pulling your socks up, or not taking things too seriously. i don't know, drama right. but this was a sad story. and that's not to say that happiness didn't come from it. but all i really remember is how alone i felt, in all of it. women and their secrets.

An Important Moment In Sand Writing