From A Distance.

https://buymeacoffee.com/lynnfergy

You know what I absolutely do not miss? - when people used to talk about having a ‘five-year plan.’ It definitely used to be ‘a thing’: Like Tupperware parties or Jane Fonda's workouts, or the Atkins diet. It was something everyone was meant to do.

The five-year plan: when you plot out what you want to do with the next five years of your life, and have a clear goal as to where you want to be in half a decade.

Or maybe just a thing that people said to me. “Lynn, what's your five-year plan?” as in, “Lynn, is there some sort of hidden order to the apparent chaos of your current career path?”

But for me, five-year plans have always been a bit like hamsters: Yes, it would be lovely to have one, but they're a lot of work and I am actually allergic.

Mark and I bonded over our complete inability to work a five-year plan. We’re very much of the ‘Let’s do a lovely thing. Whoops, something pretty shitty just happened. Let's get past that and do a lovely thing again,’ philosophy. And that has served us fairly well.

Nowadays, if anyone asked me about having a five-year plan, I'd laugh in their face, or maybe look dolefully into their eyes, ask them if they were feeling ok, or maybe I'd just quietly judge them for being drunk.

Because I am fucking exhausted. In fact, I'd go so far as to say I'm exhausted being fucking exhausted. I'm not miserable, not unhappy, just a bit worn out - like a two-day-old party balloon bopping around. The furthest I get to planning is working out what's for dinner of an evening. And I know I'm not the only one. Because exhaustion is now ‘the thing’. The thing that's present in everyone's household.

Anyway, earlier this week, as I congratulated myself for a day of achievement: doing laundry, earning money, finishing a project, and cooking dinner, I thought how my day, as lovely as it had felt, would probably not score highly on a five-year plan.

And it got me thinking. Where was I five years ago? I wasn't writing Notes From The Valley, but I obviously was still writing, because I seem to have been doing that for around 475 years. So, out of curiosity, I had a dig through my computer, and here's what I found:

Spring 2020

We’ve been holed up here in Tweddley Manor for so long now that I’ve started painting doors. To be fair though, I did this to avoid drinking wine. Though, in my defence, there’s nothing like drinking a couple of buckets of Chardonnay to make you forget your worries about the impending world shortage of toilet rolls.

But today I ventured out of Tweddley Manor for a visit to the Urologist - and no, I don’t have a prostate -though after too much Chardonnay, even that could be up for debate.

I went to the Urologist because he is also a radiation therapist - don't worry, I’m good. I just have to have radiation to prevent cancer from doing yet another irritating encore.
I had gloves on and a mask and was mindful to keep a Clatty Pat’s safe distance.

For the uninformed: Clatty Pat’s - real name Cleopatra’s - was a VERY dodgy disco/nightclub in Glasgow.

Open late and in a convenient location, it was generally frequented by a random cross-section of late-night partiers: Lonely aging lotharios, parties of screaming girls in stilettos, packs of roaring boys in slip-ons, irresponsible ne’er-do-wells, night staff after finishing a shift, students skipping college, late night drinkers looking for that one last double vodka and coke all gathered at Clatty Pats to posture around in the dark on a permanently sticky carpet.

Ever the anathema of classy, Clatty Pat’s staff dressed in togas served bad beer and even worse wine, while colored lights flashed and terrible nineties music blared. The shy, the cool, the lonely, the desperate, and the downright insane grooved on the dodgy dancefloor, amidst a throng of Ouzo-fueled individuals who enthusiastically and mistakenly believed they had a sense of rhythm.
Hence why a ‘Clatty Pats’ distance was necessary, because if you weren’t careful you would get your arse felt, or your purse stolen, or if it was really really bad, you could pick up something awful. (By something I mean a part-time bricklayer called Malcolm, or a wannabee hair extensions trainee called Senga-Marie.) And you would definitely feel terrible in the morning.

Frankly, if more people had attended Clatty Pat’s in the 90s, nobody would find the concept of social distancing tricky at all.

The Urologist’s office was - as I’ve found with many cancer places - very chilled out. Though you have to have your temperature taken before you can sit down, and periodically a member of staff dressed like a stormtrooper cleans all surfaces with Lysol wipes, the atmosphere is actually very pleasant. People - keeping a Clatty Pat’s distance - chat about books or gardening or recipe ideas, like there's nothing weird at all going on with the world.

As it’s my first time, there’s a mountain of paperwork to be done, and a bit of waiting as the Radiotherapy Doctor considers all the different notes from all other specialists about my particular cancer du jour.

It’s quite an interesting wait though.
A smart-looking blonde lady, three seats down from me, sits shivering until the nurse appears and ushers her through to the back.
Sitting in the row of socially distanced seats opposite me, an older man cracks jokes - George Burns style - to anyone who’ll listen. His middle-aged son sits next to him, sometimes rolling his eyes and smiling, other times shaking his head, trying not to laugh.

A steady flow of people arrive, have their temperature taken, check in and go straight through to the radiation area to have treatment. They re-emerge about 20 minutes later, as though nothing much has happened, and with a “See you tomorrow,” head off back home.

When the older man is called in to see one of the specialists, the room falls quiet.

Sitting in the silence, I think, not for the first time this year, how amazing humans are, and they adapt.

Everybody who had come in for treatment had at some point been told of “The Big Discovery.” Each one of them would have had to break it to their families, tell their friends, comfort those who were scared for them, and to try to absorb long lists of information as to what if, what about, and what realistically were the prospects.
There will have been tests and surgeries, and blood draws. There will have been endless endless waiting, and pain and worry and drugs.
Yet, here they all were, turning up. They laughed at bad jokes, chatted about something small they found interesting and took time to care about what made beef tender in a casserole.
Every one of these people had at some point come face to face with the prospect of the Grim Reaper. Yet here they were with their hats and their wigs and their headscarves, heading off back into a - frankly currently fucking terrifying - world with a pleasant, “See you tomorrow.”

Somewhere down a corridor, a door opened. The older man had evidently finished his meeting with the Specialist, and I could hear him cracking jokes about his rabbi. The Specialist chuckled and I pictured the man’s son shaking his head and smiling. The old man laughed, and then his tone became more sombre.

“It is like this,” he said. “My father lived to 82, and my mother - rest her soul - 82. I’m just saying, I am 76. Is there any chance, any chance at all, I could make it to 82?”

The question hung in the air for a moment, before the Specialist replied, “Let’s aim for 82. Let’s go for it. You just keep doing what you’re doing, and I’ll do what I’m doing, and if we don’t get to 82, we’re going to get really damned close.”

And the old man said, “Thank you. I’d like that. I’d like that a lot.”

And then a door opened, and the man and his son appeared in the waiting room. He nodded me a smile, waved across at the lady behind the desk, and with a flamboyant “See you tomorrow,” he left.

So, why am I telling this story? Not because I want you to worry about me. Please don’t. Really, I’m good. Hand on heart. I’ve honestly faced greater danger in a night out at Clatty Pat’s. I’m writing it because I need you to understand something.

Right now the pressure on everyone isolating is mentally and emotionally crazy.
It’s hard to be sitting at home - especially if you’re on your own. It leaves too much time to question everything - the past, the future, the what-if.

But I want you to know, that if you’re staying home and keeping a safe distance, then you are my fucking hero. And not just mine, but the shivering woman in the pretty blonde wig, and the skinny African American lady in the headscarf.
You are the hero to the startled-looking youth who is way too thin, and the middle-aged man in the sports shirt. You are a fucking lifesaver for an older man and for his son and for a Specialist who, on a random Wednesday morning, has to discuss whether 6 more years of life is possible for a man who just doesn’t want to leave his grandkids.

This journey can feel lonely, relentless, and tough. So, on the days when you find yourself sitting on your sofa, still in your pajama pants because you’re not quite sure what you’re meant to get dressed for, I want you to know what you are already doing for people you have never even met.
On the days you find yourself questioning where the world will go from here, and what might happen to you, please know - just know - that you are one of the good guys. And in the way of all the best stories, the good guys ALWAYS win through in the end.

Big germ-free love,

Lynn
Xox

I got a bit tearful reading this letter from my past.

But it did make me think.

Maybe there is something to these five-year plans after all. (I know, I can't believe I'm saying this either.) But instead of looking forward, you get to look back.

How about a five-year plan of all the things that you've dealt with in the past half decade? A veritable spreadsheet of all of the things that you've gone through and survived and kicked ass. A reminder of how far you've come and of your 100% success rate.

Because looking back, no wonder we're all exhausted. These past five years look like they've been planned out by a raccoon on crack.

But the best thing about looking back is that you see that nothing is forever (apart from maybe Tupperware. That shit is indestructible) and that all phases come to an end eventually. I can barely even remember the continual visits to radiotherapy, but I do remember it felt completely relentless at the time.

In terms of the future, sometime in the next five years, I'm looking forward to looking back on this time now, and being thoroughly impressed that we somehow found our way through it.

And maybe I'll look back on this Note. And I’ll laugh remembering Clatty Patty's, and marvel that I actually used to go there voluntarily. And I’ll definitely reflect on how so many things always look so much clearer from a distance.

Xo

PS: Every time you click on the wee heart emoji on this post to like it, your adorability increases tenfold. That’s a lie obviously - you’re full pelt adorable as it is - but it does wonders for my algorithm and I am incredibly grateful. xo

P. P. S: If you enjoy talking/listening/stories/ random facts, come and join me and Mr Tweddle this Thursday at Fish and Bear. This Thursday we will be back a MacLeod’s in the Magical No-Kings-dom of Van Nuys. xo

Click Here

And because I am totally showing off - look, I have a book for sale. Written when I had two fully functioning arms - though no better grasp of punctuation.

Volume 2 is available now: US, UK, Can, Aus

Audiobook link https://amzn.to/3Dh0MVP

If you do buy a copy, please leave a review on the site as it helps people know that I write in proper sentences… erm sometimes xo

From A Distance - Audio