Leggings – the next day.

Leggings – the next day.

I was so tired I slept again, that makes three nights in a row, which means the Maggots are losing their effectiveness no matter who they pull in with stories of what they will hand out as prizes.

I began to wonder if my old radio set was still up in the loft, years before, when I lived here during the war years or just after I had one in the safety cubbyhole I called my bedroom in the loft. Paul (who was famously Greek) made it, after submitting plans so that if I was threatened by someone unstable I could rush upstairs up some curved rails to the tiny room and out through a sneaky snaked tunnel. It was only just large enough for me and led to his flat. I had to practice the tunnel, weekly, yet I never had to use it for real. Some years later he told me that it was a good thing we'd left as another tenant had opened a loft room with access to the roof outside. He'd made it dangerous. I'd always secretly wanted a door up there. I often wonder if its possible to get my radio set down, or if its been taken or used by someone else... Like a treasure chest of the past... Not that I remember how I did it back then.

I used the old radio set to talk to others around the world, it kept us up to date on what was actual out there. Paul decided to take a shop in the center of Norwich, in the lanes which eventually up until early this year became the Arthritis shop. We lived there for a bit, in the flat above and in the house behind. There was a terrible thing in the yard, an open drain. It was really old Norwich. We never hung the washing out.

I fancied the shop as a pharmacy with displays of lovely colored bottles, bits and pieces, medicine, yet it was never quite like that. Paul used it as a base for his maintenance business – taking on jobs when they came up, it was more an office than anything. Sometimes he stored bits of wood and odd things. He wouldn't put curtains up, as he hated them. He allowed me to have large free standing blinds as they do on the continent instead. So that I could close the window to get out of bed safely. Some days I'd knit, or sew, or make reed baskets and sell them. It was easy enough. Or I'd go to school.

At the time my leges weren't so good, my wounds played up, and arthritis set in. The shop is on a slant, and sometimes as if playing a joke on me, it kind of 'kicked me out' of the door of the shop. Paul said one day,

“I think the shop sometimes leans too much to one side, perhaps its subsidence!”

I stood outside, rubbing my legs and trying not to cry. It did look more lop sided.

Then one day he came back home and said abruptly, “We're moving,” and he told me to go pack up, so I did. I was used to all this upping and going. I'd done it for years.

“Is it the shop leaning?” I asked.

“No, not exactly,” he said, “I think I have the answer for that now, so I'm going to put some support in for the roof, and then we can leave it safely.”

I asked him why we needed to leave. “I think you'll end up through the window before very long,” he said uncertainly, “It's as if the front door has it in for you!”

I had to smile, as we left, it kicked me again, and I slumped against the window jamb, “Almost got me!” I said.

He picked me up and we went quickly, leaving the keys for the next person in the hands of someone else. I think we might then have gone over to Watton for a while to sort out the problems in Clarence House there. These were early days for us, he had a rich brother in England who he said he'd never bother – and we made our own money where we could doing small and honest work – either with psychic or with maintenance or by our writings. Sometimes by my craft work or my take on my Grandmothers medicines recipes. We both worked. It was the way of an earlier world, children were small adults and should work. It was my job to light the fire in the very early morning... mostly he black-leaded the oven though. I was spared that.

I was still quite dark in coloring and very small. I had a nice voice and sang. It was before the world went dark, and I became an ugly white girl.