Saturday Night Fever

I actually began this blog with a slightly rudderless tirade against all the pressures in life that people face these days, especially to conform, but I deleted it in the end as its inclusion felt rather unsporting. Perhaps it was the calm that has befallen the flat ever since the children and the artist cleared some space in the living room, turning down the lights and dancing solidly for eight songs as I played some music through the laptop. There was fancy dress. Clowning. Pastiche. Much disco. I even filmed some of it on my phone as practice, if you can believe it, for my trip. Now, as the artist lights a candle securely set back in the fireplace, and our son holds the artist's cup of decaffeinated tea in his hands, and our daughter tells me how many pages of her book she has read, any kind of complaint seems ill-placed. No, the rest of the world, family and friends excepted, can back off just now. We have our invisible wall and we just so happen to be using it. Invisible, because manners are important. A wall, because people penetrate. Also, as the candlelight illuminates the blood-red rose petals above the fireplace, I keep thinking of things I will need shortly and jot them down in my large hardback notebook. Once the list imagines itself complete, I will deduct from it what I think I can get away with not having. Research. Planning. Contingency plans. What equipment will I need? These are the sorts of questions. I have also been told not to overpack. I seldom do. After five years of living across the ocean, I returned with just the one suitcase, and that was pretty empty. Admittedly I disappeared to the desert fairly soon afterwards, via the odd broken bone and car crash, but I have never been particularly materialistic.