Sunday, March 18

 

 

We slept restlessly and woke early. I changed all the sheets and I did this two songs kept going through my mind. I recognised them as two of the songs we heard every evening when we ate dinner at the hotel. They played the same tape every night, and it started with overwrought versions of Without You and To Love Somebody.

I can’t liiiiiive, if living is without yoo hoo oo oo, I can’t giiiiiiive, I can’t give any mow woe woe or. And so on.

I walk through the woods which turns out to take a long time. The ground has become a mountainous landscape consisting of blocks of ice of various shapes and sizes, welded together, with sheets of ice stretching between them, and the occasional patch of dry land. I get onto Linnanherrantie and step out into bright sunshine, long shadows, and a deep blue sky. I photograph a car in the distance that seems to gleam without apparently standing in direct sunlight.

I will walk for an hour, after which we will have breakfast and realise, with surprise, that ten thirty has not yet arrived.

I will open InDesign and begin working on the programme for Irma’s father’s funeral. To do this I will have to remember how InDesign works. Once I have done this then it will proceed rapidly, and I will have it finished in an hour or so. I will print a pdf of the collated booklet, and Irma will mail a copy to her mother.

She will then suggest going for a walk and so we will put our coats on and set off for the sea. Failing to finds any ducks on the ice we will walk along and find a huge dog wandering around on its own. We will stay talking with it until its owner saunters up to fetch it. He will take it for a walk and we will guess that the dog had just started early on its own initiative.

We will get home after an hour to receive a phone call about the inevitable single proof-reading error in the draft programme. I will correct it and send a second version.

Naa will come round for dinner. She finished her work practice yesterday and has next week off, and we will sit and laugh again about Irma’s attempts to talk sternly to completely baffled refugees while wearing large pink rabbit ears.

We both have busy weeks so we will head for bed early. I, at least, will fall asleep immediately.