The Visitations
Dear Friend,
Today I let an estate agent photographer into Mum’s house to take photos for the upcoming sale. I’d got there fifteen minutes early so I could commune with the space. On this bright March morning, I walked into the lounge and told myself, just have a quick check, in case Lily is there. The red chair was still gone, and with it, her too.
Maybe I’ve had all the visitations I’m going to get from Mum. After Dad went we had a parrot at the window, then a mewing cat who followed us up in the lift and slept over, just the one night.
The first manifestation from Mum was this January when, in bed, I experienced a pressing on my lower legs. So firm was the pressure, I wondered if this was a deep vein thrombosis. The next day, I reenacted it, and worked out the sensation was definitely coming through the duvet from above.
A second visitation was last week when my dress was yanked down from the back, so briskly that I turned to see if someone was behind me, playing a trick. No one was there, but it was a very Lily-esque thing to do.
This third appearance takes a little longer to tell.
In late 2024 I was asked whether I would tutor a memoir writing course at the National Centre for Writing (NCW) in Norwich. Called ‘A Life Written’, and now in to its sixth year, this specific 2025 variation was intended for over sixties who identify as LGBTQ+. The offer came my way via an English Professor at Anglia Ruskin University who, years back, had been introduced to my writing through my first novel, In Search of the Missing Eyelash. When I met this professor online, she told me it was one of the few books she had packed and unpacked as she moved houses. This meant a great deal to me.
In the same meeting, the director at NCW asked if I would run a taster session on the 9th December 2024 for those interested in joining the course. I was to talk a little about life writing, my approach, and answer any questions, all over tea and biscuits. I agreed and I was so looking forward to it.
The day before the taster, on Sunday 8th December I had finished preparing my notes. In the afternoon I carried a mini, dressed Christmas tree down to Mum. On it I had hung a few of her aunt Elsie’s baubles. When I turned up she was fast asleep in her chair, so much so, that I had to check she was alive.
She woke, immediately saying, ‘I hate Trolls.’ It had caused me to laugh, but she was ever so disgruntled. Before she had dropped off, she had been watching the animated feature, Trolls. I agreed it was probably an annoying film, but these days she could only work the five terrestrial TV channels and it being a Sunday, meant her usual favoured programmes weren’t on.
Min and I had sat with her, admiring the Christmas tree, trying to bring a little seasonal cheer into the room. She wasn’t quite with it, but I was used to Dementia altering her from moment to moment. Min had gone through the TV guide with her, about what was on next - a Bond film - and they agreed that this was something she would enjoy.
It turns out ‘No Time To Die’ was the last film she would see. Irony doesn’t even come close.
The morning after her death, with only two hours sleep, I got up, dressed, and made my way to Liverpool Street station for the big day at the NCW. Through the years of writing Lifting Off, my memoir, I’d developed a survival skill, which is a strong sense of self-compassion. Now, if I hear any tricksy self-critical voices, I know to shush them aside. So, as I stood on the station concourse, knowing I was in shock, and in pain, I talked to myself with a motherly voice: Karen, you can have anything you want from ANY of the shops at the station, I said. I chose a croissant and a hot chocolate with squirty cream.
As the train sped along, the sun pulsed my eyelids. The winter sky had been dark and grey for so long, the blue light over the flatlands warmly patted my cheeks.
When I reached Norwich station I was met by David, a comic strip artist and a gay elder with a long white beard. My co-tutor on the memoir writing course, I had only briefly met him once before at Norwich Book Festival. As soon as I saw the look of concern on his face, I crumpled.
‘Shall we get a cup of tea?’ he suggested.
‘Let’s keep walking, can we?’ I said. Keeping in motion seemed the right thing to do. On the way, he asked if he could take me to a chapel. He said he wasn’t religious, but thought it might be good before we made our way to the writing centre.
‘It may help gather your thoughts,’ he said.
‘Yes, I’d like that,’ I said, rolling with it. ‘Let’s do that.’
We walked onwards. I am not a believer in ‘god’, but I do believe in the great mysteries of life and in saying ‘yes’. And I believe in leaping into the unknown. David explained he was taking me to Julian’s chapel. Julian of Norwich (born 1342, died after 1416) was a woman and the first female published writer in the Western world. She lived with her cat in a monastic cave.
During a near-death experience when she was aged thirty, Julian started to receive visions (or “showings”) which she began to write down. Then Julian moved into an anchorhold (a monastic cell next to the church), where she meditated on her visions and offered spiritual care through a slit in her cell. Waves of the Bubonic plague decimated the city, but Julian was able to console the broken-hearted, that each person was loved.
In the midst of her ministry, she said the calming and hopeful words, “All Shall Be Well.”
As I entered Dame Julian’s chapel, a bowl of hazelnuts in their shells sat on the side. Julian is said to have had a revelation when she saw a hazelnut and that it represented “all that is made.” That the world’s energy, and sense of possibililty, lives within a nutshell.
I picked a hazelnut from the bowl and warmed it in my hand. I thought of the novel that I am writing, how I’d written the ending last year, before starting the beginning. Pushing the warm hazelnut into my pocket, I walked towards Julian’s cave, which was a side room to the right of a few pews. Filing out was a group of animated women after a meeting. They greeted me warmly. Their atmosphere reminded me of Mum and her friends.
I lit a candle for Mum, Buddy the Chihuahua and Dad. On the window ledge there was a poem.
This anonymously written poem reads:
Juliana
She’s thinking lately about the dying season
Winter and its disappearing light.
At night, she walks and prays her homespun
prayers nine steps across her room’s wide world.
She’s made her rosary small, one bead to have -
a hazelnut to hold, enough of grace
to cup within one hand. She holds this seed
sprung in the dark as if she held a tree,
a forest; indeed, the world in winter.
This night-watch for the coming light.
And so she walks her prayers’ imagined light
scattering leaves from summer’s trees.
The darkest day will soon be here and gone.
Her window holds a chain of stars.
When I arrived at the centre, I was greeted with great warmth from the staff. A bit later we sat in an airy room with a long table. The choice of biscuits was something else.
Potential course attendees began to arrive and soon all the seats were taken. I began by discussing how life writing need not be about a whole life, but a slice of time. It could even be about one moment. I had been thinking a lot about what Wordsworth calls “spots of time”. These “spots” are potent memories that, when written about, can help a person grow and learn something about their lives. I continued by saying how I liked to picture these spots as if they are our own personal constellations of stars burning bright in the sky. Take the Plough (or ‘the saucepan’) for instance - I have gazed up at this constellation from different places across the globe and found it comforting when I locate it. The saucepan is made up of seven major stars, which join up to make the whole shape. What if we imagined our lives as seven stories burning bright within us, waiting to be told?
Just at this point, the door opened. A tall and striking woman entered all flustered.
‘Sorry I’m late,’ she said. ‘I’m always late, even if I’m early.’
‘Don’t worry at all,’ I said. ‘Come. Take a seat.’ I held out my hand. ‘Hi. I’m Karen.’
‘Oh, so pleased to meet you,’ she said. ‘And my name is Lily.’
Write soon, write often.
Your friend,
Karen xx
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beautiful as always xx