a map of my heart

I was thinking of what to write about today, and then this line popped into my head and then the next, and suddenly I was writing a short story. I really wasn’t planning on it, but sometimes that’s just the way my mind works, I guess…

I have given it the title Map.

I drew a map of my heart. I coloured it and shaded it. I framed it and hung it in plain view. I watched as the dust settled on it and blurred the lines. My feelings became duller the harder it was to see the outline I’d drawn.

This suited me for a while, for I had grown weary of my emotions ruling my life. But gradually I realised that without my feelings I was living the zombie life. I lived as though I was already dead and I found it to be dull.

So I took my picture down and blew on it to remove the dust. As I blew I saw the map was no longer there. All those years of neglect had left it too weak to survive. I had to start again. But I no longer remembered the paths that used to be so familiar and I could not recall the pattern of its beating.

 

 

My only solution was to get to know it again, to test it out and see how it ran. I started small and took my heart to my friends and asked them to show me the lines that they might remember. They helped me trace my edges, but only I could trace the core.

I tried to use it to see if that would remind me and got a kitten to practice on. It was cute and fluffy, but the first time I watched it crunching a spider I lost the love I had for it and gave it to my friend the next day. I missed it though and knew that it was part of my map now. I reclaimed my kitten and learned to live with its cat nature.

I met a kind man in a queue one day, we chatted to pass the time. He made me laugh and invited me for coffee. I felt another path begin and agreed. I found myself learning to depend upon him and gave myself to him. I was surprised to find that as I drew these new lines of my heart the lines of his were weaving themselves in too.

I carried his heart in mine and felt safe knowing he also held my own. We lived together in happiness for many years and my heart map was thriving and I learned all its places. But there were parts of it that I never found again, that were lost forever to my knowledge.

But I had learned to be more myself and less afraid. I felt sure the corners I’d lost were gone for a reason. And I realised that my map might not be the same as it was at first but that didn't make it less good. Only different.

 

So... 

 

Yeah, what did you think?

Superman and tropical fish

I got myself a treat today :) I found the boxset of Superman films in Morrison's for a tenner... So that's £2 a film, genius... The main reason I got these, other than my childhood crush on Christopher Reeve, is because of a twitter discussion about them.

 

 

 

I remember loving the films as a kid, I remember that we always watched them when they were on TV. But I don't remember all of them. And I haven't seen the reboot they did a few years ago at all.

 

I'm excited to have a movie marathon with them and also know that madam will be able to watch it to. I think I might have to just watch them by myself first though. Bit like with Harry Potter when I watched all of those last week. I knew madam was ok with the first two but on re-watching them I know that she still would be afraid of all of the others...

 

I started writing this post much earlier today and then, whilst typing I happened to look up and noticed that the fish in my dad's tropical tank were acting strangely. They were all at the top of the tank and looked to be struggling to breathe.

 

Also the water looked sort of green-ish. Panic set in. I have spent most of the time that I've been looking after these fish I've been panicking about the marine tank. Which is fine. But the tropical suddenly drastically not so.

 

I took to twitter in the vain hope there would be someone there that might help. And I was in luck. Lovely friend talked me down and gave me tips as to what I could do. I also rang my brother as although he was too far away to come around he did at least keep his own fish up until his move.

 

I had noticed that the water in the tank didn't seem to be moving, and had no idea how to fix it as everything seemed to be switched on. Bro suggested that the pump had gone if the water wasn't moving and remembered where my dad kept a spare (see, that's what siblings are for). I managed to remove the old one and replace it so that the water started flowing again.

 

Sadly, some of the fish haven't survived this experience. Including my dad's beloved gold nugget plecostomus. But having managed to prevent the entire tank from dying off I think he'll be okay with it. On a plus point, one of the fish my dad has been waiting to keel over now has! 

 

I'm not sure what it's called, but it's big and stripy and kept eating some of his smaller fish. I think it was supposed to be in  there to eat snails...

 

Anyway, if I'm going to get the first Superman under my belt this evening I better get on with it!

more about my writing project and some holiday plans

 

 

Last night, at midnight, I was allowed to start writing for my camp NaNoWriMo project. Now, I had decided that I wasn't really going to do very much as it was late and I needed to think a bit about where I wanted the story to head.

 

And then somehow I had written nearly 2000 words and it was just after 1 in the morning. Oops... So bedtime was a bit later than planned. But I had a brilliant idea come to me and I needed to get it down. I need to start thinking about some of the more dangerous parts of what I want to happen.

 

Having to write a novel synopsis for camp has already meant I had to make a decision about where I'm taking it. I think it might be going to get a bit darker than I had perhaps originally intended, but I'm quite excited about it :)

 

For anyone who's interested my camp profile is here though I'm not sure whether you'll be able to see it without being signed in!

 

My plans for today do include doing (probably quite a bit) more writing at some point. I also have to get madam and I ready to come and spend a few days here at my parents as they are going on a trip to Stratford to watch some Shakespeare. We will be doing cat sitting and fish feeding duties.

 

There are four cats of which only one, Tesco, will go anywhere near madam. The others mainly spend their time trying to get as far away from her as possible. They'll be so thrilled we're moving in!

 

 

 

This is Molly and Bugsy begrudgingly sharing a chair. They actually do this quite a lot now, but they both pretend they don't like it! The other cat I'm looking after is called Banzai who has the most beautiful velvet fur. She also drools when she's happy... Delightful!

 

I am also hoping that we'll be able to have a trip to some of the museums at some point this week. I have been meaning to take madam to the transport museum for ages but we never seem to get around to it. I am determined to make it this week or else I can see it never happening!

 

There's a chance I may force myself to have an ice cream sundae from Baskin Robbins if we're going to be in the vicinity ;) I was rather hoping that at some point in the Easter break I'd get chance to go to the cinema with my friend as we both want to watch Oz the Great and Powerful, but it's looking unlikely :(

 

I shall have to content myself with using my dad's Wi-Fi to keep me amused!