Don’t know why
There’s no sun up in the sky
Stormy weather…
Recently back in the swim after a week in the Doldrums, I’m reminded of an artist friend’s tale of a telephone conversation with his elderly aunt, when builders replacing the roof slipped and broke through the ceiling into his studio, filling the house with soot and plaster dust. ‘I’m phoning you from chaos!’ he complained. Her reply: ‘Oh I didn’t know you were in Greece, dear.’ Curious, the way we make a geography of states of mind; as if despair or delight were foreign countries we could visit and as easily leave behind. ‘In heaven, I’m in heaven’ the song goes – but only when ‘we’re dancing, cheek to cheek’.
There’s no sun up in the sky
Stormy weather…
Recently back in the swim after a week in the Doldrums, I’m reminded of an artist friend’s tale of a telephone conversation with his elderly aunt, when builders replacing the roof slipped and broke through the ceiling into his studio, filling the house with soot and plaster dust. ‘I’m phoning you from chaos!’ he complained. Her reply: ‘Oh I didn’t know you were in Greece, dear.’ Curious, the way we make a geography of states of mind; as if despair or delight were foreign countries we could visit and as easily leave behind. ‘In heaven, I’m in heaven’ the song goes – but only when ‘we’re dancing, cheek to cheek’.
So there I was, stuck*, on the same spit of land I’d foundered on many times before. The view was achingly familiar: a few scrubby bushes, a grey expanse of sea merging into a grey sky. The occasional frigate bird loomed overhead; otherwise, only the rippling, the sough and hiss of the sea. I was alone, with no prospect of, or desire for, company. I couldn’t write, the words there, somewhere, but out of reach. My sleep was broken or invaded by strange dreams of loss and failure. High and dry: not just stranded, but out of the water for some time and likely to remain so: hence, without hope of recovery or rescue. Apparently beaching can be deliberate, either for maintenance and repair, or prior to breaking up. I was unsure which applied to me.
It turns out the ‘Doldrums’ really is – are? – a place: a low-pressure area in the Atlantic around the equator, where sailing boats might be stuck for weeks for lack of wind, where ‘becalmed’ equals frustration, an inability to move, back or forward, rather than flooded with sweet peace. It’s the perfect metaphor for the low ebb – ‘a state of weakness or depression, lacking vigour’ – in which I found myself during the last ten days or so. I’m guessing ‘low ebb’ is also originally nautical: if the tide is at a low ebb, is there simply not enough water to stay afloat? At its extreme, I suppose, a craft is ‘beached’, grounded in shallow water.
The Doldrums are also prone to sudden squalls, thunderstorms and hurricanes. The few who ventured near me last week will recognise the signs: unpredictable dips in atmospheric pressure and outlook, banks of glowering cloud, explosions of sound and fury, the odd downpour giving way to persistent drizzle. I’m not proud of these outbursts, wish I could head them off before they materialise. I came upon an unlikely co-traveller at the weekend when I heard Bruce Springsteen talking on the radio about depression and the coping skills he’s developed. With what I discover is characteristic humility, he spoke about recognising the beast for what it is: ‘This is something that comes, it’s also something that goes, you know and maybe something I have to live with for a period of time… But if you can acknowledge it, and relax a little bit with it, very often it shortens its duration… sometimes it’s just time… or the right drugs… these are all things that can pull you back into your life.’
I'm wondering what pulled my fragile little bark off the sand this time. Being outside certainly helps, and the Botanics is beautiful, even on days as wintry as today. Mainly I think there were three stages. First, a series of frantic attempts to shift myself off the shingle interspersed with hopeless MAYDAY – ‘m’aidez!’ – signals. The only result: digging myself in deeper. Next, accepting the situation, battening down the hatches and sitting it out: cold and lonely it may be, but it’s not dangerous, certainly not likely to be fatal. Last, looking up, looking around and out beyond my little patch of shore, trying a different direction. We inch ahead through the shallows until, with a scraping sound, we slide into deeper water.
Perhaps the gloom is seasonal. In Old English the month of February was Solmonath – ‘mud month’. In the real world, it’s certainly rained enough recently to turn the firmest ground to mud. Thanks to the persistence of my birding brother, I’m warming to the stuff. Mudflats are great for watching waders. I’m even learning to distinguish one kind of godwit from another although my bird-watching more usually takes the form of gazing across glistening saltmarshes in search of the metaphorical – until reality draws me back. Last Sunday was the 10th anniversary of the deaths of 23 Cockle Pickers whose boat was cut off by the rapidly rising tide in Morecambe Bay, not far from where I did part of my growing up. The tragedy drew attention to the plight of migrant workers: their gangmaster sent them out across treacherous quicksands with no warning. They couldn’t speak English. Some couldn’t even swim.
We’re more familiar with other migrant stories these days. Suddenly 23 comes to seem a drop in the ocean in comparison with the thousands who have drowned in their search for a safe haven. With these in mind, I return to the word ‘foundered’ which I used so lightly of my own small upset. Checking, I find that despite its casual sense of stumbling or coming to grief, originally it meant to fill with water and sink – to the bottom, presumably, since it derives from the Old French fondrer to submerge from Latin fundus bottom. Run aground I may have been but not quite sunk and, although depression is not helped by feeling guilty, of course there are always many worse off. I catch the end of Eddie Mair’s Monday interview with Steve Hewlett whose ‘cancer journey’ has been shared with listeners over the last few months. Faced with the stopping of treatment and the news that he may have only weeks to live, he was married in his hospital room at the weekend. As always his honesty, humour and courage are sobering. What’s strangest is that he doesn’t seem to have lost sight of gratitude – for his family, friends, doctors, and his radio audience. For Bruce Springsteen, coming out of depression puts him in touch with ‘how blessed my life has been’. A literary hero of mine, John Burnside, puts it differently: writing, he says, is what he ‘steals’ from ‘the usual flow of things, from all the noise and interruptions…’ along with happiness, and ‘grace’. The notion of grace stays with me as the wind fills my sails. The rain has stopped. The sun may be out tomorrow.
* Beached but not stranded, unlike the hundreds of pilot whales who beached themselves on Farewell Spit in New Zealand's Golden Bay, their deaths made more poignant by the irony of the names.
Thanks to Raymond for his Auntie Margaret story
Bruce Springsteen's Desert Island Discs and Eddie Mair's Monday inteviews can be heard on BBC iPlayer
John Burnside's My writing day was published in The Guardian last Saturday 4th February
You can listen to Etta James sing Stormy Weather here
All photos (except the whales) were taken in Cambridge University Botanic Garden on 10 February
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