Dreams - Nothing More Than Wishes?

A view from Elm Lodge

“Dreams are nothing more than wishes and a wish is just a dream you wish to come true.”  Harry Nilsson, The Puppy Song.

If my recent dreams are anything to go by, I must have some very strange hidden wishes. Perhaps it is the effect of the lockdown and the pandemic or it might be that I’m eating too much chocolate during the evening – we’re still allowed a little pleasure – but I’m having some very vivid, weird dreams that can stay with me all day. Up to now I haven’t had nightmares or bad dreams, though I wake up during the early hours and feel immediately relieved that whatever was happening was only a dream.

Many years have passed since I worked in a primary school yet one night my sleep journey took me back there, where I was expected to take a Year 6 class and I was trying to explain to someone that there must be a mistake as I hadn’t been told and I wasn’t prepared. The person I was talking to was laughing and telling me I’d be fine. I was arguing that I’d come to work with infants in groups of six, not juniors in Year 6. I woke up before I was forced to face a class of enthusiastic eleven year olds. Phew.

I know that the trigger for that dream was a conversation I’d had with a friend and colleague from those happy days. Often there isn’t a reason.

In another dream I was on a swing, suspended from a great height, aware that one wrong move and I could fall. The swing was taking me too far backwards, so that my body was horizontal and my only safety was how tight I could keep hold of the chains attached to my seat. Something went wrong, of course, and I was falling with that horrible sinking feeling. Luckily, I woke up before I hit the ground, the sea, or whatever was below me.

Going to sleep, I think of happy things and my favourite places. I imagine myself travelling in a motorhome – I haven’t got one, but I don’t let that tiny detail spoil my fun – doing the North Coast 500 would be wonderful. Somehow, as I fall asleep, the gremlins get in and take over my dreams.

My poem, 

The View from the Lodge

Between the trees, the distant hills
Fade from green to grey.
I drink it in and take my fill
Of all I survey.

Beyond the gate the horses graze
In the lush pasture,
I’m happy to recline and laze,
At one with nature.

Paradise, where my soul belongs.
My dreams bring me here,
Surrounded by gentle birdsong
Any time of year.

PMW 2021

Thanks for reading, sweet dreams, Pam x

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Silence - I'll Settle for Quiet

“Go placidly amid the noise and haste and remember what peace there may be in silence.”  (From Desiderata by Max Ehrmann, 1927)

How refreshing it feels just to be quiet with no distraction. I like to have the radio or a CD on, but sometimes it’s good not to bother and go about my housework duties in silent prayer or lost in my thoughts. My thoughts are bordering on torturous at the moment. A mini crisis which I needn’t bore you with and I’m sure it will blow over with some self-counselling and a quiet word above.

The place that offers the most silence is our favourite lodge in Dumfries & Galloway. Off the beaten track, hidden by trees and foliage, any sounds come from nature – and the fridge thermostat kicking in – owls, foxes, deer and the ripple of the nearby stream. Dare I believe that we’ll be there in just a few short weeks? Recently arranged and neatly in line with my retirement, we will sample summer time at the lodge. Very rare, we’re usually out of season visitors, but very welcome after lockdown.

The back garden offers tranquillity, depending on the day or time. The sheltered side, nice for a quiet read, never on a Sunday, though. Someone in the neighbourhood will fire up their lawn mower, strimmer or electric hedge cutter and kill the moment. No one around here has a massive garden, so what takes hours with some extra loud machine, I do not know. Someone else nearby likes to entertain outside and after winter and lockdown, it is clearly back on the agenda. Raucous laughter, which we hadn’t missed, and, I am told, the smell of a barbecue was apparent at the weekend. The best time to sit out is on a week day during school hours, until the boy across the back comes home and starts kicking his football against their wooden fence. They have to start somewhere, bless him.

At work, we hear the sound of silence at the end of the day when the fluorescent lights are switched off and the high-speed drills stop buzzing in our ears.  It isn’t my domain but there is something I find peaceful about a spotless, empty surgery, prepared for the next day. I accept that I’m a strange one. Somewhere a phone will ring and an answer-phone will take a message. I won’t miss much of this.

I am happy to fill my house with the noise of four lively grandchildren coming to tea, make sure they have fun and enough to eat and enjoy the peace and quiet when they’ve gone home.

My Haikus:

My washing machine
Is torture to all ear-drums
When it’s in a spin.

Stressed and troubled, then,
When dental drills stop whining
Serenity calms.

When the noise has gone
And there’s a moment to think
About what makes peace.

Hushed in the darkness
The unsettled baby girl
Loved and nursed by me.

PMW 2021

Thanks for reading, keep well. Pam x

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A Very Private Place - Sanctuary

 

I’m back from a welcome break. I dread this time of the year, miserable mornings and dark tea-times. Everything seems like a major effort. It’s like an illness and the older I get, the worse it feels. The best thing is to go away and talk myself into accepting winter. I spent a few days of rest and recuperation at my favourite location in Dumfries and Galloway. Close to Loch Ken and on the fringe of Galloway Forest, a concealed single track lane winds through the countryside leading to a cluster of timber-clad lodges. They are each set in their own space, surrounded by trees and shrubs and positioned so that none over-looks another. Next to the lodges, a couple of stone-built cottages face the courtyard of the old manor house where the lane ends. We stay in one of the lodges, quiet, hidden, a very private place.

We found it by accident. A few years ago we were searching online for weekend accommodation in the far north-west of England to meet up with family who were travelling down from Ayrshire. Our previous destination at the top of the Lake District was too expensive at this time and we wanted an affordable alternative. We didn’t intend to go into Scotland, but we found this place – well within budget, even with extra travelling costs – and decided to go ahead, with the understanding that ‘you get what you pay for’. With that in mind, we were not expecting much. We were certainly not expecting the high standards that we found in a warm, cosy, spotlessly clean, very well equipped wonderful lodge, in the middle of nowhere. Of course, we missed the turn off. It’s easily done.

That was the first of many visits. I love the isolation. The nearest shops are six miles away in Kirkcudbright, or seven miles the other way to Castle Douglas. There’s nowhere within walking distance for us, apart from, well, going for a walk which is usually my first occupation in the mornings, taking our spaniel out. No WiFi, no phone signal, no trappings of the fast moving electronic world. It’s refreshing to escape, listen to the sounds of nature, watch woodland animals and relax. 

We’ve got it off to a fine art, now. We pick up groceries and supplies on the way and upon arrival we are soon unpacked and settled in. This was our third visit this year. The woods and hedgerows were rich in autumn and winter colour of reds, rust, gold and green, edged in white with morning frost. Walking our dog early one morning, I was thrilled and surprised to see two deer very close to the lane. A little further up, our presence disturbed a pair of pheasants, the majestic male with his glorious blood-red plumage and golden speckles took flight, quickly followed by the brownish, chestnut speckled female. It’s a privilege to be so close to nature. I’d rather listen to owls at night than speeding cars and sirens. 

This hidden gem is my perfect sanctuary. I feel a lot better for my visit. 

Sanctuary

This is a very private place,

A comforting, cosy retreat

Where we find peace in our own space

And rest until we feel complete. 

Close to the forest, near the loch

This is a very private place

Beyond the grazing Blackface flock,

A home from home, a perfect base. 

We snuggle up in warm embrace

And listen for the woodland sounds

This is a very private place

Where playful rabbits have no bounds. 

In the semi-dark of twilight

An owl, a fox, maybe a trace

Of deer or something to delight

This is a very private place.

 

 

 

Thanks for reading, Pam x

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