An old friend visited…

Yesterday, a knock at the door was an old friend who I have known since I was about 13. He was in his mid-twenties, the younger brother of friends of my parents. I ran into both of them earlier in the summer and, not recognising them, it was a chance remark that revealed our past friendship.

I confessed to Hugh that I had a slight crush on him at the time. He was good-looking, single, and turned up irregularly. All the ingredients to be noticed by a traumatised young girl who felt like she did not exist.

It turns out that the two roads in which he has lived are the two roads that two of my closest friends lived in. It was so strange. I was visiting where he lived in two roads over 30 years.

We chatted, and I made us tea and coffee, while he did some washing up for me. Then he helped me reframe one of my photos. I gave him my phone number on a torn piece of notepaper that I found in my living room drawer. On it was written;

“Chrissie, sorry for involving the council. It was Dawn. M.”

I had completely forgotten the existence of that note! It is inconsequential now. Hugh took it and noted my phone number.

My day did get a little difficult as I find smallest jobs to take a while now. A dear friend in Malaysia has been sending a WhatsApp as he goes to bed. It gives me a time check to remember my evening meal. For some reason, he told me something and I thought I had caused a problem for him, but no, it seems that he was sharing thoughts that were not necessary for me to know.

Flowers in a birdcage…

Yet we need rules so that we don’t harm others.

I found a tiny birdcage and so I planted a plant in a small pot and put it inside. I have hopes of a climbing plant growing around the bars of the cage.

I am expecting an old friend in half an hour. I haven’t seen him in twenty years. He is the younger brother of a boyfriend. I use boyfriend loosely as although we were exclusive for the most part, we never declared our relationship and I often felt manipulated. He expected me to know when he was going to arrive.

He left for Italy and I left for the rest of the world.