Dear Mum,
I know you worry about me and you really shouldn’t. I know I make some terrible decisions and that’s ok. If no one made terrible decisions then they would never learn from their mistakes. We all make mistakes, but I’m very happy here and like you said I don’t think about the future. I know you say that in a bad way but I think it’s a very good thing to just live for the day. It’s not as confusing as constantly having to think about tomorrow and next week and the rest of your life, it’s simply do I want a flat white or a chai latte? I’ll give you an example right, this happened a few weeks ago .I couldn’t help but notice her, trapped somewhere between 80 and 90 years old I’d say, with hair a soft meringue of white curls and her diminutive body wrapped in a thick brown wool coat, actually incongruous on such a stifling hot day. She hobbled by, half her body weight supported by this indispensable wheeled cart thing and the other by a walking stick. Her mouth was pulled across to one side so she took on the appearance of a Mrs Potato head toy during its most experimental phase. I couldn’t help watching her. She had this sloping face that screwed itself into a walnut of frustration and her words dribbled out much to the irritation of the shop assistant where she’d wandered. She was in a shop now in the shopping centre in Dalston and I was just stood there watching because she was so fascinating.
A what? He asked, frowning.
An oover, I want a little oover to do me stairs with.
A Hoover? He repeated, quite patronising actually.
Yeah, an oover to do my stairs, a little one, for me stairs.
We don’t sell Hoovers, he replied rather haughtily despite wearing a badge clearly empowering him as Houseware Manager whatever that is.
A little oover, the old lady persisted, for me stairs.
No, sorry, not here, you’ll need to try somewhere else.
His response so perplexed the poor old girl, any passer-by could almost see her soul banging the roof of its own body demanding a quick release to the spirit world. I was captivated.
Where, she managed, where can I get me self a little oover thingy?
Argos, I suggested.
They both turned to me, he with the reflexes of a cat, her taking what seemed almost an entire minute just to face me.
Argos?
Yes, Argos, said the manager, relieved to have been of some use.
With that he fairly skipped across the shop floor and scurried away through a door in garden furniture.
Where?
Her lopsided face searched mine for some answers.
I gave her directions with the deliberation of someone talking to a three year old. Then repeated them again very slowly and off she trotted.
I went to the supermarket and about an hour later I passed her in the arcade, pushing her wheeled cart thingy and she looked very close to tears. She was no nearer to Argos than before but I didn’t have time to take her there personally, in fact I feared if I slowed my pace and stepped in time with her, I might never quicken it again.
She stopped a young mum gripping a pushchair who was talking nonstop into her phone.
A little 'oover, for me stairs, where could I get one?
But the young mum stayed glued to her phone and shook her head as if to say, get away freak!
But I got to do me stairs.
The old woman sighed shrugged her bony shoulders and wandered out onto the street.
But I couldn’t stop thinking about her, even looking for her. Then one day I saw her. She was coming out the front door of her ground floor council flat, she wore a straw bonnet on her head and dragged her trusty wheeled cart behind her, I wondered if the stairs she longed to clean belonged to a different house in a different time and whether she’d ever live long enough to find them again.
So you see Mum, I am quite content living in the present.
Much love, your Dizzy Girl.
So you see Mum, I am quite content living in the present.
Much love, your Dizzy Girl.
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