Day 165

I’m not very focused today (except work, I hasten to add). The last two nights have been what I call insomnia nights, and I’m dog-tired, and don’t actually understand why I haven’t been able to sleep. I do know that a part of me is worried about going on holiday for a whole variety of reasons, the main one being that I’m just not very good at taking holidays or relaxing. It’s an age-old battle. One of my past relationships started on the slippery slope when my then GF asked me to go on hols for 2 weeks and I wouldn’t because I thought working was more important. However, I do nowadays realise it is very important to take time out, time for myself, time for our marriage. But the worry remains, and some of it comes from the knowledge that I’ll have four weeks of work come in for the two weeks I have off. Everyone, including the sainted M, tells me that I have to put that to one side, that it’s ridiculous to assume I’m superhuman or even to try to be superhuman. I just need to get organised, load up my Kindle, and there are certain authors I have traditionally taken on hols with me, so I’ll be finding more books by them. Many of them are actually self-published, and write about romance, time travel and mystery, all stuff that takes me away from work and other real life.

The mini-keyboard has arrived, but I haven’t yet tested it. I’ll do that after dark. I am listening to Test Match Special again, because there is a very special test match final day going on in Nottingham as I write this, and the background sound of the crowd and the progress of the game have been very soothing and motivating to work along to. I am now refusing to move from my chair in the study until the game is over. I broke one of my superstitions about 15 minutes ago because I needed a comfort break (that particular tradition being that you have to stay the same seat for the duration of a period of play), and England lost a wicket. I cursed myself, of course.

Much of this will be total gobbledygook for those of you who don’t know, follow, or even like cricket, but I won’t apologise for that. This is my life. The sun is shining. Cricket on the radio. Serious things to be thought about. And for all that cricket is seen as being a posh game, it is actually, in my view, a microcosm of life, with ups and downs like life itself. Yes, I am more of the mind-set now that it is only a game, but it is the greatest team game (on a philosophic level and a practical level). Only chess and epee fencing get anywhere near matching it.

I was sitting in the sofa with M last night when a possible ending to Aggie flashed across my mind (perhaps that’s why I couldn’t sleep). I had no paper anywhere near me, so I jotted it into the notes app on my phone. And then, when I couldn’t sleep, I decided to order some A4 notebooks so that I can put the whole of this year’s blog into its own specific place, because the now 10-day backlog of sticking it in my journal has been stopping me from writing poetry into my journal. And as soon as I went back into the house at about midnight after doing that, I immediately scribbled a new poem (I haven’t read it back to myself yet, so it could be dreadful) into my now rededicated poetry and jottings notebook.

The game is over (no spoilers here). I will now go for my daily walk before the next part of Aggie’s adventure.

AGGIE’S ART OF HAPPINESS – CHAPTER 119