Reflections on the puddle of life

Sigh. It’s back to work tomorrow for me. I don’t mind really, but I’m not in a rush to go either. You know how it is: once you’re there it’s fine, but the thought of going is pretty depressing. Still it’ll do me good. Having less free time always seems to make me make better use of it. Instead of sitting on my backside and watching TV I’ll be cycling and writing and sewing and learning Japanese. With only a few hours a night to do what I want, I still manage to pack it all in. Why is it that we only appreciate things that are in short supply?

I eat much more healthily at work too. For lunch yesterday I had ½ a banana and a handful of Quality Street. Not healthy. Tomorrow I’ll be back on fruit for breakfast and fruit with lunch. I make a fruit salad with pineapple, melon and kiwi, and it’s a fantastic way to start the day. It’s a strange thing about Christmas, this time for feasting. We’re supposed to want to stuff our faces and yet my house is full of food I don’t want: sweets, chocolates, mini pastries. My appetite has totally bombed, all I want is fruit, hummus and little sticks of vegetables to dip in it, miso soup and pickles, sushi. Cleansing food. I don’t even want wine, and I always want wine! Probably I’ll want wine when I’m back at work

Anyway, you may be wondering what this has to do with tall buildings. I would too. The past couple of days I’ve had really strange dreams, and both had tall buildings in them. I’m wondering if it is something to do with changing jobs. In my first dream I was starting a new job, not the job I’ve got but a different one. I was going to work in the city in head office and this was situated in a very tall building. My office was near the top and I found I didn’t have a lot of work to do, in fact I could do pretty much what I wanted. I walked into a side room which was rather large and edged all around with windows. Through the windows I could see other tall buildings, impossible buildings, and as I was looking, although I was in the centre of the room, I started getting vertigo. It’s a horrible feeling, if you’ve ever experienced it, your knees go weak and there’s a fizzing sensation in your stomach and you feel like you’re going to fall over. At first the vertigo only occurred when I looked out of the window, but after a short time it happened wherever I was looking. I thought, ‘how can I do my job if I can’t even stand in my office?’ and decided to head for the elevator. I didn’t make it. Instead I woke up with that awful feeling in my stomach and every time I closed my eyes the vertigo came back. In the end I got up.

Last night I had another weird dream. It was a strange amalgamation of Battlestar Galactica, Star Trek Voyager and Beetlejuice. Don’t ask! Again I was in a tall building, I was in an elevator and I was looking for something. I went up into the building then had to find my way because what I wanted was outside. I came out of the elevator and out of the building into a grassy area. People were gathered in groups on the grass. I found the person I needed to speak to, then suddenly realised I was a virtual person, a programme, something not real. I think I was meant to be Kara Thrace (Starbuck – Battlestar Galactica link!) This made me feel better because something bad was going to happen but I knew it couldn’t hurt me. I found the man I needed to speak to, but it was too late, so I went back inside the building and did everything over again, as though I had restarted time, but this time Captain Janeway (Voyager link!) came with me. But she got it wrong and the man I was supposed to speak to was killed by a giant digital display on which a digital version of Beetlejuice was capering. I got a virtual sword and tried to kill him, but he kept jumping away and I realised I would have to get into the display to do it. So I went to climb in, but then I woke up. Weird.

On a separate point, I have £30 to spend on books and no idea what to buy with it. Unusually, for me, nothing is really catching my attention. I was thinking of getting a Knut Hamsun book, maybe Mysteries, and The Master of Go by Yasunari Kawabata, possibly. And maybe something science fiction, perhaps Valis by Philip K Dick. Maybe. Oh, and there's a collection of short stories by Italo Calvino called Numbers in the Dark which is really good. I've got it on loan from the library at the moment. What comes over in Calvino's stories is his clear joy in the written word, his stories are clever and funny and he makes it look easy. Actually he made me think I ought to give up, I haven't got what he's got. I'd quite like that too, but then I don't feel like I desperately want any of them. I'd just like them. Perhaps I've been spoiled. I just read Number9Dream by David Mitchell and his brilliance overwhelms me. It's a hard act to follow.

Any suggestions?