of tantrums and tents

Last night Aeolus stalked the skies of suburban London.

To lie in bed in the early hours of the morning as the god of the winds plays havoc amongst the trees and garden gates along the street, rattling roof tiles and ripping clouds from their moorings to scud across the sky.

To lie in the dark as moonlight, like steam, billows across the walls. To hear the wind turn the corner of the house, and feel it draw its fingers across the window panes…

Is, strangely, comforting I’ve always thought. To be cosy in bed when wild, wild elemental fury unleashes itself on the ordinary world outside is a feeling of being cocooned, safe, warm and glad. It’s the perfect time to roll and find a warm drowsy figure next to you, and perhaps make some love in the joy of sharing a nest in the storm…

…alternatively you could do what I did, and open the bedroom door, and let the dogs in. And so we lay, at 3.30 this morning, by candlelight, hairy bottoms and wet noses (not me!!), and a glass of wine and listened to the storm swell and rise, to driven hail and the manic clang and clatter of Aeolus’ chariot passing by.

I’ve had trouble sleeping recently. I’m late to bed anyway, but this past week, even when I’ve made it abed by midnight I’ve still been wide awake at 2. It probably happens to us all periodically, and I know better than to fight it now, so I’ll try to regard it as a chance to catch up on some reading. I’m perilously close to finishing Mason & Dixon which has defeated me for years.

The alarm will go at 6.30 come what may so there’s very little point in getting anxious? And, since it has happened many times in the past I refuse to lie there and let my mind run riot while my body tries to find a comfortable cool spot in a bed that is beginning to resemble a sack of seed potatoes. Trust me, unless you have nary a care world, never lie in bed in the dead, dread hours of the night and take stock of your life.

So I’m sure it was 4 or 4.30 this morning when I finally slid back and closed my eyes on Toffee’s rump.

It’s like the storm, it will pass, I know it will in a childlike way - because it always does. So it’s comfortable, my bed is like the thick walls of the house, a place of shelter.

And hopefully, when it does, I won’t wake up in the office with drool on my shirt…