Multiple anxieties

What do terrible people, several suspicious deaths and a herd of angry cows have in common? They’re all integral to the plot of my upcoming novel Claws Out. It was only after finishing it that I realised there’s one main character who’s never given their dues - and that’s North London.

It’s funny trying to write something this week, when all anybody wants me to talk about is the wedding I went to last Friday. Thee wedding. And yet I cannot talk about it, and nor do I much want to given it wasn’t my wedding and therefore not really my business to tell anyone about. But the pressure is immense.

This was the week I realised that climate change is real. While you roll your eyes at my unbelievable stupidity up until now, obviously I understood that it was real before. I knew the world was heating up, I remembered colder winters and cooler summers. I hid inside when we had those 40 degree days back in 2022. I darkly wondered if my nephew would ever see snow in real life. But it all felt like the really bad stuff would happen down the line. This week I really understood it was now.

I’m late writing this week because I spent five days in Scotland with my family, wrestling two kids under four and persuading my mother that I’d be safe walking from one end of a village to the other via what she described as a ‘rape alley’ - in reality a lovely wooded path where I witnessed several rabbits frolicking. We discussed the probability of a local (or even big city) fiend waiting by this path every evening hoping for a hit but she wasn’t persuaded by my assessment of the likelihood.

It usually goes down like a bucket of cold sick at a christening when I say that I think a majority of men dislike women. NOT ALL MEN*, I gasp as I take my dying breath, I know you Kevin love working with women and have a t-shirt which says “this is what a feminist looks like” which you haven’t actually worn out of the house since 2016 when everything went a bit wrong (though you still wear it to sleep in and feel a little tingle of righteousness) but other, much worse men.

Last week’s final SNL episode of the season showed a sketch about Margaret Thatcher closing the mines after workers discovered millions of murderous Mr Blobbys living underground. It was so absurd and brilliant that I’ve been laughing about it to myself all week. As a result, I’ve been thinking about Thatcher a lot more than I’d like. She even invaded my dreams which I really resent because normally I enjoy that break from reality.

Have we moved on from calling everyone we dislike a narcissist? For while you couldn’t move for people calling their ex/mum/sister a narc or stumbling across a stranger online (without any formal qualifications) listing the ten red flags to spot in one. A narcissist was a selfish person, a mean person, a manipulative person but also just a person you felt didn’t hug you enough, a person who broke up with you and hurt your feelings.

What a week! For someone who intensely dislikes going out multiple evenings in a row, I was happily tested by a four night stint. A pre-launch for my new novel Claws Out! (The ! Is part of the title and I fought for it) because apparently a book launch is no longer enough and there must also be a party merely for the announcement of said book.

Happy bank holiday, did you go to a garden centre or are you under 40? I did because, as of eight days ago, I am a gardener. I assumed it would come for me at some point in middle age and never sought it out as a result. It’ll happen when it’s supposed to happen, I thought, like some kind of Instagram sage. Last week I looked out at our small patch of garden and felt a crushing sadness at the neglect. Weed city, bees skipping over our plot to head next door.

My dog is at the vets. Again. My dog goes to the vets without protest because at this point, the staff there are basically his step-parents. I’m sure he knows bad shit is about to go down when we park up, but he faces it with an air of resignation which can only come from multiple extended stays where he’s learned it's better to just accept his crummy fate.