Convalescence

In Forest School last week we were learning about hibernation, with the aid of a small knitted hedgehog puppet. As I sit recovering today from a wisdom tooth extraction last Thursday, I am sorely tempted to make the time pass by sleeping soundly for a few weeks and waiting for this time to be over. Except I’m human, not hog, and so I must stay awake and vaguely functional. It feels as if all the energy in my body is directed towards the wound in my gum, although at least this morning I bear less of a resemblance to a lopsided Orson Welles as the swelling subsides. Never a good look for a middle-aged woman.

Writing feels difficult and pointless under these conditions, I fear sounding peevish. I do sound peevish. I find it hard to concentrate on reading, hard to put my thoughts in order. I’m too tired to do my usual bounding along walks and must content myself with shorter ones, trying to “see the joy in small things” and wanting to throw things at the self help peddlers that suggest such banal solutions. Except annoyingly, I know that on one level they are right, and I have even written such things myself. Contrariwise as Tweedledee would say.

Therefore I shuffle out to the garden between rain showers and investigate the progress of my spring bulbs, which I have to admit are pretty miraculous. A little dry brown blob that lies dormant in the soil for most of the year, then thrusts up towards the light to bloom on the gloomiest days. Unless of course it has suffered excavation at the paws of those wily rats with good PR (the squirrels). The tulips in the main bed are already shooting strong, but it is the snowdrops who are always first to flower. One patch always slightly earlier than the rest, the delicate drops milk white against the dark soil. There are several myths around snowdrops, apparently for early pagans the green of the stem symbolised health, and the white flower represented strength. I ponder this as I look up the definition of convalescence and find that it means to grow in strength. Although there are some darker stories of snowdrops being unlucky, signifying death if brought indoors, mostly they are seen as a sign of hope, of better things to come. Perhaps fitting then that a substance found naturally in snowdrops called galantamine has been used to treat the early stages of Alzheimer's.

I have been continuing the drift down the Mississippi with Huck Finn for my bedtime reading, and have also been enjoying Entangled Life by Merlin Sheldrake as an audiobook. Enforced rest has also done wonders for my knitting output, I've finished a pair of arm warmers for my daughter and am already half way down a new pair of socks.

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