A dot on the horizon

Trying to put makeup on when you're jet lagged is like trying to ice a gateau with a shovel. It's tricky.

Mind you, wearing actual clothes which are not those of a pajama-esque nature feels positively inhuman - I don't know how air staff do it.

Jet lag really messes with the body. Though your eyes might accept that you've landed in a different territory, it takes a while for the rest of your body to actually agree and accept.

I'm back in the Valley after the jaunt to the UK, and the jet lag is intense. My body is stiff - and not in a good way - and I feel like one of those giant metal shipbuilding statues we used to drive past when we were in Scotland.

In Port Glasgow, there’s these two 33 ft tall metal statues that stand between the main road and the Clyde. Where they stand was once a hub of shipbuilding, with the clang of metal and machinery and shouts and whistles and life and pay packets and industry. Around 30,000 ships were built on the Clyde in the 19th and 20th centuries. Now. there are just these two giant statues, positioned against the skyline as a reminder. Great metal ghosts of a burgeoning life that once was.

I don't know why I'm so jet-lagged, because the flight wasn't that bad. It wasn't full and so each one of us managed to snag a double seat. Granted the journey took around maybe 16 hours, but I've been on worse journeys.

I watched Muppet Christmas Carol on the plane. And yes, there were other options, but I wasn't in the mood for guys in superhero catsuits saving the world, or gritty tales of drug cartels. And I'm not sure I even liked Bridget Jones's Diary the first time. So Muppet Christmas Carol it had to be.

Say what you like about Dickens, but he knew how to write. It takes more than a bit of skill to make death festive. And besides, what could be a better combo than Dickens, Michael Caine, and Miss Piggy?

Aiming face powder at my giant marshmallow head, I am not feeling optimistic about the aesthetic results. I'd do anything to stay home. But that's not really an option. My face looms in the mirror like a Muppet version of myself.

I'm going to a formal event. In a church on a Saturday in mid-December. By rights, it should be Christmassy, with little kids singing “Rudolph the Red-nosed Reindeer.” I cheer myself up at the thought. How many times have I been in churches in December while kids in Christmas outfits, bursting with cuteness, sang songs and battered tambourines, showing off or shuffling about? I sigh. There won't be kids. My friend probably taught as many kids over the years as the Clyde built boats, but those kids are grown now and won't be there wearing reindeer antlers and singing, not unless they're certifiable.

My shoes pinch. My perfectly normal shoes that used to fit just fine, feel like they might have been made for someone else. My feet don't want to be in these shoes. Bloody jet lag.

I visited my friend before I went to Scotland. She was in hospital then. It was clear from our meeting that both of us would soon be traveling. And we both have. But only I have returned.

It's not a funeral. It's a celebration of remembrance. I like that. She would like that. More like a party, less like a heartbreak. It sucks to die. Especially so close to Christmas.

There is never enough time to do or say all the things that we would wish. The thing is to try to do as much as you can in the time that you have.

Got to hand it to Dickens, eh? He knew how to write a quality sentence or two.

My body feels sore and stiff. I can't look at my face and I don't like being in my shoes.

I say it's jet lag but I know it isn't. I have so many feelings, but none of them can land because none of them fit amongst the tinsel, and the trees, and the twinkling lights. So I will go out and face this day like a giant steel statue.

I picked a reading for her to say at the church. It's not Dickens; it’s from someone called Bishop Brent instead. When I found it, I figured at some point in his life, he maybe visited Port Glasgow.

The Ship.

What is dying?
I am standing on the seashore, a ship sails in the morning breeze and starts for the ocean.
She is an object of beauty, and I stand watching her till at last she fades on the horizon and someone at my side says: "She is gone."
Gone!
Where?
Gone from my sight that is all.
She is just as large in the masts, hull and spars as she was when I saw her, and just as able to bear her load of living freight to its destination.
The diminished size and total loss of sight is in me, not in her, and just at the moment when someone at my side says,
"She is gone,"
There are others who are watching her coming, and other voices take up a glad shout:
"There she comes!"
And that is dying.

xo

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