It's that time of year again

when I'm scared to open the bathroom door

It’s that time of year again.

I’ve always been afraid of things that could move fast or in an unspecified direction. So that’s lizards, toads, mice, snakes and most of all - spiders, my

arachnoid hell. I don’t remember a time when I wasn’t terrified of them. As soon as I see one my heart begins to race and panic rises and I’ve got worse, not better, over time. I’ve had all the advice, none of it helpful, ‘they won’t hurt you’, being the most risible. Don’t try to rationalise this, it’s not rational. I know that and I can’t help it!

Up until the end of 2005, if I spotted one I would take out my contact lenses, and because I couldn’t see the menacing outline clearly, I would be able to hoover them up. Part of my motivation was appearing blasé to my daughters so that they didn’t inherit my phobia, because I didn’t want them to grow up having the same fears as me. They did. Roll forward to December 2005 when I had my eyes lasered, so now I am able to see their outline only too clearly and I am fixed to the spot when they spring out from wherever they’ve been lurking. They trap me by being between me and the door, so the best I can do is screech for my husband to get rid.

He’s used to the routine - if they are easy to get to he will remove to the end of the garden and rebuke it for trespassing, so at least that gives me some respite until it finds my kitchen or bedroom on Google maps and makes its way back. However, if it’s in an inaccessible place, an under the bed or in a cupboard type of devious spider, he applies the Karcher long hose and I don’t care who condemns me for it. By this time I will be in hysterics and have thrown myself out of the house awaiting the all-clear.

Sometimes my husband has to go back to the UK for a few days, and last Friday, having spent a week of Mike’s absence full of trepidation in case I should be confronted and menaced by one of the big hairy brown things. I was feeling more cheerful. I had got through the whole week without a sight of one of them. In my defence, I can Karcher the tiny bodied, spindly legged ones that we have most of. I still start to shake but I can usually get rid. Big brown hairy jobs (BBHJ)? No, I’m frozen to the spot. So back to Friday when my husband was coming home in the afternoon and I was just relaxing, having spent an hour on zoom with friends where we talked of the autumn invasion of BBHJ and their various methods of dealing with them, none of which I can manage. Their advice was sensible but of little use to one rendered as helpless as myself. The call ended and I went into the kitchen to make coffee and there in the corner on the floor was the biggest fuck-off BBHJ I’ve ever seen. Sitting up on its haunches, it stared me out, and I expected it to say “Did someone call?”. The size of a small mouse, it could be seen from outer space on a clear day.

What to do except run, which I did without hesitation to my new tenant upstairs, not caring if he thought me a basket case. He was unpacking his shoes, of which he had many. I must have looked a sight - ashen, hand-wringing, barely able to get out a sensible request. He came right away - with a dustpan and brush. I said he could use the vacuum cleaner to get it but he said it was no problem. I waited outside the kitchen door. “Oh, it is a big one!” He confirmed, and appeared in the doorway holding brush firmly onto dustpan. “I’ll just put it into the neighbour’s garden,” he smiled like that was a Good Thing. It was not! I wanted to shout “Kill it! It doesn’t understand boundaries, it thinks it has the right to roam.” But it was too late, it was gently thrown into the pampas grass on the other side of the fence. I could have wept and wondered if it was too early for a gin and tonic.

Mike’s flight was delayed because of a French air traffic controllers strike, so I went to collect him from Bordeaux and went on to the south of France for a week’s holiday after a long season looking after visitors. I only had the cicadas and mosquitos to worry about there, but I sent my husband to scout the house first when we got back. I bet the BBHJ had a ball while we weren’t there. “Come in Lads, isn’t this a great kitchen for a party?”

🕸 🕸 🕸

I’ve just read - Bella Mackie’s first novel “How to Kill Your Family”.  Writing a bit sloppy but as it’s her first novel I’ve rationalised that, loved the pace and the language, and I don’t think I’m giving any spoilers when I say there’s a great plot twist.

I’ve listened to Natalie Haynes ‘Stone Blind’ on Radio 4 and BBC Sounds. Natalie Haynes can do no wrong in my eyes and I love her series ‘Natalie Haynes Stands up for the Classics’. This is a novel about Medusa, a mortal living in a family of gods and monsters, whose life is changed forever when violence strikes,  and it’s a good listen late at night, so I’m sure it’s a good read as well. The reviewers are formidable -

‘Witty, gripping, ruthless' - Margaret Atwood via Twitter
'Beautiful and moving' - Neil Gaiman via Twitter

I’ve visited Tate Britain this month and a stunning installation is The Procession by Hew  Locke. If you’re in London, go - it’s joyous and thought-provoking all at the same time. http://www.hewlocke.net/Homepage2ndsite.html

That’s about it for this month, you lovely people. I’m back in Jersey now for a few months until it’s time to travel back to the sun. The view from my window this morning was wild and windy

But my flowers don’t care about the wind, totally serene

And finally, finally, it was my great pleasure to meet - in 3D - Silvano Stagni. We’ve been meeting over zoom for 2 years, so it was wonderful to sit beside the Tower of London and chat writing, until a very self-important raven started shouting at us complaining that there was no food in the bin and he had to make do with eating a napkin!