Unnerving – to write 400 words straight off. I was taught to think before you speak – think before you write.

Finishing the day-job has altered my concept of time. I spent my working life working in blocks of minutes – 20, 30, 45, 60, always working with the knowledge that this task would be coming to an end in so many minutes and the next task would start.

I am finding that there are people who have never worked that way. Their days are one long continuation – days meld into days until the job is done. This is a novel experience for me.

Last Wednesday I sailed to a river a few miles east of where I keep my boat. By early evening, I had moored, cleaned up, cooked a meal and am sitting reading. The companionway is open and I can see the trees on the steeply sloping banks and a line of converted fishermen’s cottages.

It is quiet, peaceful. The water is glassy smooth. The tide has been coming in, occasional pieces of weed floating upstream, a gentle ripple on the bows of the neighboring yachts.

Even though the boat is absolutely still and there is no noise, I notice a change. There must have been a tension because I feel it ease, the boat seems to slacken. It’s not the boat that’s slackening, it’s the effect of the tide on it. The view through the companionway alters very slightly. A few more trees come into a view, I lose sight of others. Gradually, my view alters, from trees to cottages, another boat in the foreground, to different cottages, more trees, boats. A long pause later we are realigned, facing upstream against the outgoing tide.

This is time – real time. Not one expressed in numbers. The Earth has turned, it’s relationship with the moon and the sun altered in space. The billions of tons of water that has flowed in one direction, now turns and flows away again. This is the real rhythm of life, the music that unites us and all species, this surpasses all the endless explanations we use to justify our presence in this world. This happens despite us. In the past, I would not have had time for it – my own preoccupations would have masked it, but this evening, just for a few moments, I had the privilege of feeling that rhythm, of hearing that music. I was glad.

7�6 �

“Come indoors, Claire!”

“Just a minute . . . “

No I won’t go indoors, not while Betty is being bothered. That greasy fat man has come in his shiny black car and he’s brought two police cars with him. She said this would happen and I was not to worry and she wasn’t going to let them in.  She said her boys would come to rescue her.  She said Josh has a Harley and lots of friends on bikes and the others would come in their cars and they would all come and rescue her. Where are they? There’s no sign of them.

I don’t think she’s thinking straight, not since her George died. She changed a bit then.

I do love Betty and her ways. I remember when I first went across the road and down the side alley and looked through the fence. There was this woman crying out back. I was five and I had never seen a grown up cry  . . . I have now though . . . lots of times. The gate was unlocked and I went in. She didn’t see me until I stood next to her. “Don’t cry.” I said. And she looked at me so sad. I didn’t know what to say, so I picked a flower and gave it to her. She took it and tried to smile a bit. Her hands were wet with the tears. One day last year, when I was having tea with her and Mr Pauley, she showed me that flower. She had pressed it in a book all that time ago. I was so surprised.

That first day I had gone home and told Mum about it – this was before all the trouble started, and she said that the lady was Mrs Pauley and her youngest son had just left home and now she only had Mr Pauley left and that was what made her sad. Mum made a funny movement with her eyes when she said Mr Pauley’s name. I didn’t know what that meant, but I decided that I would try and make Mrs Pauley happy and I would go there again. And I did. One day she said, “Don’t keep calling me Mrs Pauley, dear, you can call me Betty.” I had never called a grown up by their first name. It felt strange at first, then I got to like it. She always called Mr Pauley “George” but I could never do that. He was nice but a bit fierce. And now he’s dead and Betty is on her own and I don’t care if they are policemen, those men are bothering her

The year before last, when my mother and father started fighting, I went over there more often. Betty seemed to know why I was there but she never spoke of it. She could see I was upset. She would sit me down and make me a cup of her fresh orange juice and a piece of cake and we would look at old photographs of her “boys” as she called them. And she would tell me stories of when she and Mr Pauley were first married and didn’t have any money and the places they lived and how they kept moving on. But the stories I liked most were the ones when she was girl the same age as me and lived in the country and had adventures. She told me about the farm and about the horse her dad got for her, and how she rode all by herself for miles and miles. And she told me about the animals and how she looked after them and what happened when they were ill. When she told me these stories she looked so young and happy, and I forgot just a little about what was happening back home across the road.

At some point, we would hear a door slam and my dad would come out of the house looking horrid and get in our rusty old car and drive off very fast. And Betty would say “You’d better go back now, dear” and she would give me a long hug and I would go back across the road and mum would be crying and I would give her a hug too and say “It’s ok mum. I’m here.” And she would say “I’m so so sorry, Claire.” And cry even more.

And now dad’s been gone for a year. It’s more peaceful but we don’t know where he is. Mum is working in the shop down the road “to pay for food and find the rent,” she said, but I think she likes to be out doing and meeting other people.

And now Betty’s being bothered by those men and her boys haven’t come to rescue her so I must go and help her because no one else will.

“Back in a minute, mum.”

As I climb the path, the ground falls away on my left. The path narrows, the ground falls away more. It steepens to my right. Soon there is nothing but fresh air on my left and a rock wall on my right. A knot has started in my belly – just a small knot, a tightening somewhere inside. Then my knees – a wobble. Clamminess next; then dizziness; then, “Sit down. Now!” Sitting on a narrow path with back pressed against rock and legs dangling down a vertical drop. Nightmare.

“Trace it back to the first time. When did it start?” I want it to be logical. But logic is too slow for emotion in the race for fear. Logic can pull fear back, can try not to let it get away, while emotion bubbles and troubles and blasts its way forward.

It only happens on the way up, never on the way down. Up is a problem, down is a doddle.

I dealt with it years ago. I don’t sit down now. Sometimes you’ve just got to climb. Wider paths. Avoid narrow ones if you can. Walk close to the wall. Hand holds. Stick on the outside pushing inwards.

But I often feel it start – recently on a mountain in New Zealand – small mountain, big feeling.

High buildings – stand back from the window. High bridges – that feeling of falling with nothing beneath, over and over and over. As for the London Eye – I sat on the bench in the middle of the pod – fantastic views through shaded eyes.

Might there be a cause – a reason – an explanation? Aged three, I watched a man climb a cliff. Towards the top, he stopped. He fell backwards. I see him now, sailing through the air, bouncing against the rock face. I don’t remember the end.