Reality
Sometimes it’s a good idea to suspend the notion of ‘reality’ and see what else comes along to take its place.
Twists Within the Ups and Downs
They say the first step is all it takes to launch the future of your dreams. They also say that first step is the hardest.
It isn’t only steps into the future that prove difficult. Trying to get up to the rooms in the top of the Right Turret is just as hard – if not more so.
The Right Turret (pictured here on the left as the photo is from the back of the Mansion!) has an unusual Spiral Staircase that runs up (or down, depending on the way you are going!) with an added twist. Yes, you read that correctly. A Spiral Staircase with a twist. Two twists, actually. The first twist is that the rotation swaps over halfway up/down. You start climbing the stairs in a clockwise direction, and reach the top going round anticlockwise. The same with the descent. Anticlockwise to start, clockwise to finish. It’s as though the Staircase has a one-way policy top and bottom.
If that wasn’t odd enough, when you reach the halfway point, up or down, the bottom step moves itself up to become the top step. so you can end up taking the same step over and over again and not really going anywhere. It took me a while to work that one out. Half a day, actually. It can be an uphill struggle climbing and not going anywhere. Going down is much easier. You can stand where you are and let the steps carry you. Round and round, clockwise of course.
Now, it’s obvious to miss out the middle step, and reach the top quicker, but sometimes the climb is more fun than actually reaching the top in the quickest time.
At the top, however, that’s where the room is. Beyond the heavy wooden door lies the corridor. Yes, a corridor at the top of a Turret with several rooms off each side, and a final staircase at the far end leads to the Very Top.
The Very Top. The room that feels quite daunting to approach, with ominous shadows lurking where shadows shouldn’t. Whispers echo – possibly from the lurking shadows – or more likely from the vastness of the room at the Very Top.
Some ask if it is worth going through all the exertion of climbing to the top just to get to such a room. Sometimes it has to be done.
Even rooms at the top need dusting.
Week Two
My weeks in lockdown begin on Fridays, so that means today is Day One of Week Two. I don’t work on Fridays or at the weekend, so since Monday I’ve been working at home during my normal hours. The benefit of that is as soon as clocking-off time comes around I’m instantly transported back into the Mansion without the hassle of having to navigate the roadways with the, well, I’ll just say ‘other’ drivers.
The weather this week has been absolutely glorious. Obviously, I’ve only seen it through the window, but as I’ve had windows open, front and back, I’ve felt the occasional breeze as it slipped through one way or the other. Today was no exception, apart from instead of a gentle breeze it was more of a force thirty gale. I could bear it no longer and had to close one of the windows, then catch my breath, sort out my ruffled hair, and then climb out of the other window to retrieve the lengths of curtain that had been blown through. And then after that I had to sort out my ruffled hair again.
One of the benefits of not going out is the need to not need to use hair products. In one’s own presence, it doesn’t matter what one looks like, although I’m sure some of the mirrors here in the Mansion groan when they have to reveal my reflection to me. Mind you, the groan may be from me at having seen the reflection, thinking about it. And it’s more of a gasp, rather than a groan.
I’m finding myself becoming bored of the negativity that is constantly being saturated out about the virus. Yes, the pandemic is infectious. Yes people catch it. Yes the numbers are going to increase the more people that catch it. The numbers of those who recover is also increasing, but that news is positive so isn’t shared. The vast majority of people who catch the virus display mild symptoms. That too, in a way, is positive. but they are all collected together into that massive cloud of negativity. Sigh. Such is life. We mustn’t forget that we are here to live in fear, after all.
I’ve been focussing on my Place of Peace and Tranquility a lot lately. That’s a magical place that exists inside my head, where I can go whenever I need to. It is always relaxing there, with the most wonderful of views. I wrote about it a while ago here (this link opens in a new window), but the place has grown and changed a lot since then. It’s like an island paradise, where I can see whatever I want to whenever I go. It costs nothing, and I really do Feel Good after going there (and whilst I’m there as well, it must be said!) It’s probably a good job I’m here at the Mansion by myself, because for quite a bit of the time I’m here only in body… my mind is totally elsewhere (possibly gazing at a golden sunset, or the rainbows created in a mist by a waterfall, or the clear blue depths of a still water lake where the occasional swan glides on by)
So. In lockdown we do what we do. Some of us do it differently. The important thing is doing it so we Feel Good. We have time to make the most of it, so we should. Doing that for ourselves also means we are doing it for others too.
It’s gone a bit warm in here again now, so I’m going to attempt to open the front window again. I have my paperweights ready.
Flickering
The lights flickered as I stepped through the front door. Not collectively, but consecutively. First it was the the light outside the Vestibule. Next the light on the ceiling at the base of the Stairway. Then it was the wall lights around the Foyer. Followed by the lights up the Stairway, and then the ones up on the Landing. Fair enough, it happens, usually on dark and stormy nights. But on dark and stormy nights, the blinking of the lights doesn’t reverse the pattern and then start again, back through exactly the same routine.
“I’ve only been gone for a couple of hours!” I declared.
The floorboards groaned and all the lights flickered, this time simultaneously.
“I did say I wouldn’t be long. And I do go out on a daily basis! You should be used to it by now!”
More floorboards groaned, but the lights settled down and switched themselves off.
The Mansion. Subtle as ever, and always up to some kind of trick! Hopefully, things should be quiet for a short while now. Until the Mansion becomes restless again, that is!
Back to the Mansion
With the days getting shorter and cooler, thank goodness, and bones healing, I think it’s time that I ventured back into the Mansion. That’s the back of the Mansion up there, by the way. I’m going to make some very long overdue replies to comments – by that, I mean long overdue, not long comments… the comment posters may have even forgotten about the comment, so there’s no point waffling on endlessly about something that has most probably been forgotten.
A bit like this post, but that’s what it is.
I’m still here.
And I’m coming back.
(You know what I mean…!)
