Exposed to view
A RECENT reference to “the naked soul of man”, revealed by the extreme conditions through which the explorer Shackleton moved, reminded me of the experience of having my head shaved before all my hair fell out from chemotherapy. Not so extreme, though it felt like it. Doesn’t everyone receiving a cancer diagnosis almost immediately wonder, “Will I lose my hair?” I certainly did.
“When you’re falling, dive,” someone said; so I did: when my hair started to fall out in earnest, I found a barber. (I once watched a video of a group of friends who, in a magnificent act of solidarity, all had their heads shaved when one of them was due to lose hers from cancer treatment.)
As the poor, tangled remnants of my cherished locks fell away from my head, oh so gently shaved off by Al — who was, in fact, an angel — I made myself look in the mirror. Seeing my face revealed naked without adornment felt like seeing myself as God sees me. And I was all right.
Potty training
MY GP has decreed various tests, working in a parallel universe to staff at Guy’s Hospital, who continue to monitor the cancer. Could I collect a urine-sample tube from the surgery? I duly went, and was enraged to receive the standard tube, preposterously narrow.
Why, oh why, are women expected to use such impossible equipment? They may work perfectly well for men, but how can our entirely different anatomy accommodate them? And for how many years have we tolerated this indignity, ladies? Time to revolt and demand pots, not tubes. Three times the width, please.
Means to an end
I AM in the middle of the bad first draft of my next novel. I make myself write 1000 words a day in the liminal time first thing in the morning, sitting up in bed, letting the words emerge from the contact between my fingertips and the keyboard, feeling a little as though I am playing the piano without knowing the music.
I have to ignore my controlling, editor’s voice telling me I’m writing rubbish, and allow the flow; and I am regularly astonished at what emerges, unplanned, on the screen. Once 80,000 words are written, I will rewrite them over and over until they make sense and are beautiful. But, at this stage, I don’t know quite what the story will be, and I have to trust the characters to show me.
I was so relieved to hear Francesca Kay tell us, at the recent Church Times literary festival, that she writes in the same way; for her latest book is a joy to read, and highly accomplished. It’s also helpful, as another accomplished writer, William Boyd, said recently on Desert Island Discs, to have written the last page first. Thus, you know your destination; you just don’t know how you are going to get there.
Lent, with its attendant abstinence, is en route to Easter. As Plato observed, nothing tastes so delicious as food — any food — when you are hungry. I think of iftar and the joy of delayed gratification; and I long all the more for the joy of Easter for having traversed a path of sorrow to reach it. Without a journey, what is the meaning of a destination? What is that last page for?
On the shelf
BACK TO the insecurity of being a writer. (Colm Toìbin has told of his need — still — to be reassured that he can write. So, the feeling never goes away, then, even when you’re a superstar.) I have made the move from non-fiction to fiction, even as non-fiction shows itself to be far and away the easier to sell to publishers. And yet it is the stories that stay with us; and I write them because I believe I can tell a deeper truth, using my creative imagination.
Katherine Rundell’s recent BBC Sounds series on the enduring power of children’s literature is a clarion call not to deny stories to our children — or to ourselves. They awaken our moral imagination: teach us what heroism really is, and justice, and friendship, and betrayal. We remember them.
When I had to thin out our library, having sold our London flat, I worked through two large collections, discovering that non-fiction dates much more readily than fiction. Indeed, good fiction does not date. But the books on quietness, eating well, living well, sleep, the end of history(!) — even, dare I say it, some theology books — are simply left behind when the research moves on.
A bishop once told me sadly that he could tell when his parish clergy had been ordained by the books on the shelves in their studies. Once ordained, they had no time to buy and study more.
Ground breaking
I READ of the intelligence of the foot: when it comes into contact with the ground, rich amounts of information are fed to the brain and spinal cord via its skin, ligaments, tendons, and nerves, including tension, stretch, and pressure; and these enable precise control of muscles to move our joints into a position that absorbs impact and limits damage.
Our feet are the windows to our soul, a friend said, when I told her about this. Where did that brilliant observation come from? Try walking or standing or sitting with your feet firmly on the ground, and feel their connection with the earth; and imagine the soles of your feet as porous, so the earth’s energy moves up through your feet and into your body, and the energy of your body flows down, deep down, into the earth, like water or breath. There is a constant flow of connection and rootedness and openness through our neglected, downtrodden, taken-for-granted, lowly feet.
Lost reserve
LAST month, we were unexpectedly and delightfully invited to Hawaii, and went whale-watching. Surrounded by noisy and enthusiastic Americans, I felt extremely British and buttoned-up. And then we saw two whales — a mother with her calf — arcing out of the water, and my spontaneous cry of joy was as loud and enthusiastic as any of my fellow sailors’.
Footpath to heaven
MARK VERNON’s latest book, a biography of William Blake, Awake!, is a joy to read. Vernon is exquisitely tuned into Blake’s porous soul, open to the enchantment that it sees everywhere in our world. It is a book to energise, goad, and inspire.
Go for a walk, it urges me, and feel the liveliness in everything. “Look, really look, and there find [yourself] and others in the divine presence,” Vernon writes. (Not just at whales.) Don’t be one of those “who, looking back on their time, wishes they hadn’t spent so much of it in the office or on a screen, but did so because they weren’t quite sure what else to do”.
Here’s something else to do: go for a walk. And learn what the journey teaches you.
Dr Claire Gilbert is the author of Miles to Go Before I Sleep and I, Julian (both published by Hodder).
