"Fool," said my Muse to me "look in thy heart and write"

I've had stormier days, I've had calmer days, but as stay-at-home-days go this one has been fruitful.

I've made, you see, a decision.
And I'm not good at making decisions. But there comes a time when you either choose life in all its colour or allow all the bad stuff to fester and in so doing wreck whatever chance of happiness might float your way.
I choose the former.

After numerous emotional hammerings I've decided on a new course of action regarding life with Mother.
I need, I have to, do a Charlotte Vale.
Older readers might know who she is, to those who don't watch old movies let me enlighten you.
Vale was the main character in the movie 'Now, Voyager' played to the hilt by screen queen Bette Davis. In  a nutshell, Charlotte is denied a life of her own by her embittered old mother so languishes in her room smoking and wearing lipstick until a kindly doctor whisks her away to a hospital where she sheds weight and spectacle and becomes the elegant confident Ms Vale much to the chagrin of her tyrannical Mother.

I'm not saying my mum is a monster, no not at all, but she has a way of verbally crushing me till I'm almost afraid to speak. I'm so tired of it. I've left the room after such a battering and felt nauseous and hot and smashed favourite tea plates. That is not a good place to be.

So tomorrow and all the other tomorrows I'm going to stand my ground, defy her, show her that I'm not a thirteen year old with spots and insecurities and no friends. I am a nice woman who's loved and wanted and who is gregarious like her father.
I'm not a solitary human who loathes mankind and the man on the fish counter, I'll talk to anyone whatever their job or sexual preferences. Mother thinks my life is disgusting. I know because she told me.
I like to dance the cha cha in my bare feet and have people around for chats and cake. I don't want to live in a souless airless cave. That isn't my idea of life.
If the boot was on the other foot, if I was ill, I like to think I'd go crazy for life and have about me kind and caring people, people who'd wash my feet and get mildly drunk with me.
To cut people out is to go deaf dumb and blind.



I will continue to take care of her every need but I'm not tiptoeing around any more, these blasted egg shells are a pain...