Setting Sunday #8
Wintering
Happy New Year and warm wishes for 2024
It’s a month since I last posted, and since then there have been two Wintering workshops, the Winter Solstice, Christmas and New Year. Also my dad has become very seriously ill with advanced cancer and I am caring for him at his home, where I live with my 16 year old son. Family are rallying round and we have lots of visitors and offers of help now - we are very lucky.
I could have been writing about this for a long time, since Dad found out he had cancer back in December 2019, and his various struggles with chemotherapy and surgery and radiotherapy and various stays in hospital etc ad infinitum. Through all of this he has been brave and strong and stubborn, and surprised everyone with his tenacity and ability to recover seemingly against all odds.
I haven’t really written about Dad’s illness. I’ve mentioned it briefly here on Setting Sundays, mainly to explain why I haven’t been able to post consistently or run all the workshops, lead the walks etc that I’ve had planned. My writing and art projects have fallen by the wayside, although I was so pleased to get the second edition of Amniotic City out last year. I’ve tweeted about it Dad’s cancer journey here and there but I’m rarely on what’s left of Twitter, ‘X’, any more.
It’s his personal private story, and I’m aware that I am writing about it more now than I ever have. I’m so glad to be able to help and I feel so privileged to have had this time with him, since my son and I returned from Wexford in December 2021, where we were stuck in the pandemic.
I came back because my son was seriously ill after contracting covid in October 2021, and also I came back because my dad was going through double chemotherapy after months of daily radiotherapy at the Marsden, and he was struggling. We had always lived with him before and so it made sense to come back to the UK, get help and diagnosis for my son (Crohn’s) and support my dad through his treatment.
I’ve been caring for both of them for the last two years, while running my business, and, for the first year, getting me and son back into the confounding, ridiculous systems here in the UK (though doubtless they are as convoluted elsewhere). For example one of the ‘simpler’ exercises in bureaucracy -importing a car from Ireland - took 9 months of confusion, research, prayer and looking through magnifying glasses. Thank goodness for true friends who have helped with some of these complications.
It’s been indescribably tough, hugely challenging, but here I am, sat at the dining room table, surrounded as usual by books, paperwork, washing and the bits of Christmas I’ve still to wind up and store away. Dad’s very poorly, and every day is a blessing, but also very hard.
I started this Substack because I believe in the power of writing as a way of feeling better, whether that’s from being creative or writing a diary where you can write about all the tough stuff, vent spleen or write a list of things to be grateful for. I find that all of these things are connected, they are all creative expression, even if some of it might feel raw and clumsy, it all counts.
Some of this I have done for as long as I can remember, the being creative with words, the diary writing and the venting spleen. The gratitude practice came much later, along with the mindfulness, but they are powerful tools for getting through tough times. In my experience they have made all the difference.
I probably became a walking artist because walking was what I did with my dad - we walked everywhere when I was a kid. Ballet class on a Saturday morning in Kew - let’s walk those two miles from the other side of Richmond Village. We were laughing about this the other day - it never occurred to Dad that we could get a bus - I was only six years old. Walking has been my sanity, along with running which I took up nearly 12 years ago.
But when you can’t get out and walk or run or be in nature, all these things we are told are good for - and indeed are good for our mental health, there is writing and drawing and reading. I haven’t been able to write much because I haven’t felt able to write about all of this as it’s my Dad’s life, my son’s life. But it’s also my life.
Soon, things will change, there will be huge life-changing events that cannot be changed or stopped. But right now, on a day by day basis we are all doing our best, and I am wintering. My workshops were all about that… and so I will leave you with this quote from Albert Camus, which reminds me of the indomitable spirit of my dad, which I can only aspire to.
“In the depths of winter, I finally learned that within me there lay an invincible summer.”
Albert Camus
I will be back with writing, Setting Sundays workshops and walks sometime in 2024 and I hope to find time to write Setting Sundays posts every week but for a while they may be a little here and there.
Thanks for your support in 2023, thanks for reading, commenting and coming to workshops. It so SO appreciated.
Love, Lucy X
Well done!
Sending you and your dad warmest wishes, Lucy. I nursed my father through his last days at home during the pandemic. It was an enormous privilege, and upsetting, so be kind to yourself at all times. x