The Bat Scale Of Oddity

Sleep is a heavy tide, pulling at my ankles. Walk along through the day, like a long stroll on a long beach under an overcast sky, strong water sucking the sand from underfoot. This anxiety fluttering inside is difficult to categorise. It reminds me of two things: stage fright, and larvae.

It doesn’t stop me loving the first time I see Baby trying on my shoes- rainbowed sequined lace ups. She chews one cerise lace, admiring bumpy sparkles. We have lunch together, she practises her spoon work. She holds both ends to stop the food falling off.

Back at Rosehill, the smoke alarms are going crazy. There is no smoke: the rats have stripped the wires causing short outs. Messages are dispatched to Farmer Landlord and the electrician. Annoying, but fairly average for a Rosehill drama. I can sit and write with a scarf wrapped over my ears.

This anxious thing is my distraction.

Once, not being particularly regular with my housekeeping, I swept the bedroom floor and found a dead bat under the bed. I kept it, in a flowerpot on the kitchen windowsill, where it still is, because it just gets more desiccated, and I don’t know how, when the house is so damp. This anxiety is every bit as strange as the bat, and, therefore, of compelling fascination. 
Mr removes the alarms, as advised by the electrician. 
It does occur to me that there might be somewhere easier to live than here.