Francesca Bossert's Blog, page 28

PANDORA

 

Visceral niggles,

A sticky scab,

 Unspoken semi-secrets that blackboard-scratch my bones.

 I finger-flinch, choking on ancient debris.

 

Pandora is not my name,

I circle back yet again.

 Maybe one day the phlegm will clear.

 

A MOTHER’S STRENGTH

Good morning,

A couple of weeks ago I met a wonderful woman with amber eyes. She had a soft, engaging demeanour, and I really connected with her. We spoke of many things, despite the noise level in the bar where there was live music being played, which was lovely, but made it hard to have a proper conversation with a person you’re meeting for the very first time.

We spoke about health of course, as people always tend to do when they reach their so-called golden years. Maybe they should be called wonky years, instead, although that wouldn’t be quite so lyrical, I suppose. Nevertheless, at the moment, as far as I’m concerned, “wonky” seems more fitting. But whatever. I wish us all PURE GOLD!

Like me, this woman is “in the wars” as my Nana used to say, but she didn’t dwell on her own problems too much, despite having cancer. Instead, she spoke of her daughter who is a few years older than mine, and who has breast cancer. After a couple of chemotherapy treatments, her daughter felt so awful that she decided to pursue alternative methods to fight the cancer, so she and her mother have been travelling to different countries, seeing alternative therapy cancer specialists.

My heart went out to her, and to her daughter of course (who wasn’t there, I think she lives in the UK). This woman’s beautiful gaze has stayed with me, and this morning, when I first woke up (I went back to sleep again for a while, it was very early…), I wrote a Haiku for her. I believe it will also resonate with the vast majority of mothers, because we will always find hidden reserves of strength to help our children.

I hope you enjoy it.

Love

Cesca xx

A Mother’s Strength

Her amber eyes brim

with fatigue, fear and sadness.

Yet her heart still roars.

NOTHING, REALLY

Today is nothing,

Really.

Just a log fire laughing at raindrops,

The tickling smell of freshly baked cake,

A ball of blue wool becoming a sweater,

An elegantly bored cat,

A blushing maple tree serving treats to giddy birds.

 

Today is nothing,

Really.

But it is so much more than enough.

 

 

 

SCIATICA IN PARADISE

Hello!

I’ve been feeling rather flat. Actually, I’ve been feeling totally pancaked. Splat is the word. My intestines have been real little shits and I’m exhausted and fed up with them. I’ve also had horrible sciatica, so I took myself to my favourite acupuncture clinic yesterday and since Dr Dong wasn’t there, I had a session with Dr. Fan who is adorable. I won’t lie and say it was wonderful because it was flipping hard. I had to lie on my side, which is never comfortable for me as my hips and knees hurt in that position, and Dr Fan stuck needles with electric currents that flicked muscles in my bum, and a gazillion other regular needles in a gazillion other places and had to stay in that position for about 35 minutes…I wiggled a teeny bit but it was hopeless, so I just tried to breathe into it.

Finally it was over, and I had could stretch my back and hug my knees. Then Dr Fan did some cupping, which I always enjoy. I went home knackered, and did crocket with a fire going, while listening to an old Marian Keyes book (Rachel’s Holiday) that made me giggle. Then I started fiddling with a text on my phone, and it started to run away with me, and turned into this. Which could be the start of something…I don’t know yet. But it lifted my spirits, and made me giggle. Then I stuck a Voltaren patch on my bum and slept like a log!

Have a great weekend,

Cesca

SCITATICA IN PARADISE

 

Emilio was grumpy again. His sciatica clearly wasn’t any better, despite him having spent a fortune on a bespoke hands-free massage and chakra-recalibration with Tinkle Twilight, Ibiza’s internationally renowned healer to the superstars.

 “But Twinkle must have been thrilled to have you as a client!” I beamed, once again muscling into the spirits-lifting act with such vigour that I might need a session with Twinkle myself before tea-time.

Emilio performed his best eyeroll.

 And in that moment, I realized with horror that Twinkle hadn’t had the foggiest idea who he was.

 I hesitated before gently asking, “But did you not at least hum, I don’t know, Fuego de Amor, amor?” Fuego de Amor won Emilio four Grammies. Even if the song was decades old, it was still practically the Spanish national anthem, for crying out loud!

 “I might have mentioned Fuego and the Grammies,” he muttered, shrugging.

 I gazed at him, bright eyed, eyelashly-expectant.

 He scoffed. “She said the Grammies are commercial basura, commercial garbage.”

The bitch! I’ll recalibrate her root chakra so precisely she’ll be coughing up her frickin’ mulabanda, I fumed. But I kept my livid thoughts to myself.

 “Oh, cariño, she was definitely having you on!” I said congenially. “Besides, she’s clearly a Gen Z born-again music snoot who claims she only listens to chimes, tambourines and beach bongos. I bet she’s a closet Swiftie.” I giggled. “Also, she’s Turkish. Their national anthem is different.”

 “What’s a beach bongo?” he wanted to know, except he didn’t, really, he was just being a snarky little shit. He knew damn well what a beach bongo was because he loved playing his own flipping bongo at the Sunday sunset sessions on the beach at Benirràs. Anything for an audience.

 Well, if that’s the way he was going to be, he could take his leather trousers to the dry cleaners himself the next time they got gross and sweaty. And I wouldn’t be reminding him to buy talcum powder so that he could squeeze into them, either. He could bloody well lay off the Toblerone.

 Emilio turned and shuffle-limped dejectedly over to the end of the terrace. He rolled up his faded jeans and sat by the edge of the pool, dangling his gleaming caramel legs in the water.

 “Let’s face it, amor,” he said, running his long, tanned fingers through his thick, sunkissed, espresso-coloured hair. “I’m a has-been. I’m ancient history. I’m old.” He kicked a smooth jet of water towards the fat pigeon taking his daily bath on the opposite side of the pool. The pigeon just turned his back on Emilio, flapped once and relieved himself.

 It’s all going to shit, I thought, as an icy bubble of anxiety slalomed down my back.

 The question was, what could I do to turn things around?

 

 

HOWL

Hello,

The following poem is not a happy one. I always try to tend towards optimism, towards positivity, towards being lighthearted, but sometimes there isn’t room in my brain for lightness. My autoimmune illness has been roughing me up lately, and a new medication from my psychiatrist is in very early days, and those days are often exhausting as my body adapts. Last night, after a violent bout of D woke me up at 3.30am, I lay in bed, flattened, exhausted, yet unable to sleep. So I wrote sad poetry. If you don’t want to feel sad, or triggered, or whatever, maybe skip to one of my other poems, something that might be more of a giggle. I hesitated to post this one, but it’s powerful (I think) and may speak to someone who is going through something similar.

HOWL

In the rude depths of night,

my guts awaken,

Slam the door on dignity

And the struggle begins.

Relief in a shitshow

of utter depletion.

Exhausted beyond sleep,

Pummelled into a negative jumble of thoughts,

My belly drained hot, heavy,

My bones buzzing,

Nerve endings exposed, tangled in a

Dead weight of despair,

Because those who should never seem to care.

It’s just their job.

Just another shitshow.

 

Maybe tomorrow, if I howl a little louder,

There might be a cavalry, somewhere.

 

WEATHER FORECAST

Heavy snoring blowing in from the west tonight, with intensifying easterly elbow action coupled with inevitable grumbling, and a few harsh words.

Residual grunting cannot be excluded as the eastern affront pushes west, but should quieten in the wee hours.

Moderate southerly wind expected following late night cheese-platter.

FEATHERLIGHT KINDNESS

For David C. 

Featherlight expectations,

Soft gratitude

And love,

For an almost,

A might happen,

That didn’t,

Because life whirls and backflips,

Pushing options beneath the surface.

 

Yet we flow with fondness,

Inhale wonderful memories

Recall moments of heart-skipping wonder.

 

Then,

A surprise,

A soon!

And even if this soon

Just maybes

Before evaporating

Into a sorry,

Your words

Land with perfect timing.

Acts of kindness replenish

In this shrug-heavy, dismissive world.

 

Thank you for reaching out again.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

MISS DEE

 

You came to me against my better judgement,

Because you looked at me

As I dismounted

In tears,

Feeling broken and incapable,

Hurtling towards days of no more riding.

 

I stroked your kind face and said,

Sorry

As I kissed your nose.

 

And in that instant,

You knew my sadness

Sensed the beginning of my equestrian end,

And gently asked me to,

Nevertheless,

Take a chance on you.

 

You asked so softly,

With such love,

My sad no turned into an irrational yes.

 

Diandra

My beautiful, complicated, brave chestnut mare

Although our journey together ended before it really began,

I love watching your dancing partnership with Celine.

 

Thank you, Miss Dee, for asking me to change my mind.

I am so proud of you.

Love,

Cesca

Dominic, me, Diandra 

 

MISMATCHED

 

Agatha had never found Paul particularly attractive. Trying to work out why they’d become romantically involved made her brain short-circuit, similar to the way she felt when she thought about where she might find a decent rheumatologist, or the perfect strapless bra.

Even now, decades later, coming across photos of them together was guaranteed to trigger a migraine.

Flummoxed by the wide reach of his appeal, she had come to believe that something about his pheromones blinded women to his slinky vulgarity, infuriating arrogance and appalling taste in clothes. Also, why did he speak in affected, breathy whispers? Was he related to Amanda Lear?

Nevertheless, back in the day, despite his shortcomings, Paul swaggered through life with the certainty that sleeping with him was a privilege. Even in bed his posy self-awareness during sex bordered on the ridiculous, as though he had mastered certain moves and enjoyed his performance, wondering if they might photograph well. Ever broke and stingy, he didn’t believe in Christmas or birthdays, but was nevertheless most generous with STDs.

The relationship had been a short, exhausting, itchy palaver.

Agatha came to her senses with a bang when she caught him red-handed, perfecting the sultry, come-hither facial expressions he used in bars and clubs beneath the unforgiving neon light of his bathroom cabinet mirror.

She’d burst out laughing, then allowed herself the satisfaction of squeezing one last juicy blackhead from his sinewy back, wiped the muck onto the mirror, and walked out.

Yet here he was, balding, and without a sinew in sight, waddling towards her dressed in an untucked, badly fitting suit, forty years later.

“Hello there, Agatha,” he breathed, his voice deeper now, less misty. More like thick, garlic infused fog. “You’ve been on my mind.”

Agatha pretended not to recognise him as she ploughed past. She grabbed a glass of champagne from a waiter, knocked it back and flounced out of the party. The last thing she needed was a nostalgic tour of Blooperville with Paul at the helm.

Unfortunately, her car refused to start.

 

THE DOCTOR (MIS)SPEAKS

I recently started seeing a new doctor. Actually, he’s more than a doctor; he’s a retired professor of toxicology from a university hospital here in Switzerland, and works one day a week at the acupuncture clinic where I seem to spend half my life. Or have spent half my life, because I’ve recently hit some sort of acupuncture brick wall, and those magic needles are no longer having an effect on my IBD problems.

 Nevertheless, my lovely Chinese acupuncturist told me about this professor, and said it might be a good idea for me to see him and to discuss my range of symptoms. Because, so far, whenever I’ve spoken to my other doctors about my intestinal issues coupled with joint pain, extreme fatigue, aching bones, disrupted sleep, ankle cramps, an adversity to any sort of tight clothing, and a total lack of interest in food, I’m just met by a disconcerting, blank stare.

 So I went ahead and had a session with the professor who spent close to an hour with me (good!), did some basic examinations (also good!), and I felt like he actually listened. He proposed a full blood panel, which I agreed was a good idea.

 I saw him again two weeks later (it was supposed to be after one week, but he had Covid) to discuss my results. My blood is all hunky-dory, which is good news. Nevertheless, what about my symptoms?

 Cue the usual helpless stare.

 Then came the kicker.

 “You know, Madame,” he said. “You only have Microscopic Colitis. It’s very, very small.”

 It was my turn to stare at him. What the actual heck?

 Maybe he’d like to live with a very very small colitis for a while, and see how he likes not being able to leave the house for days on end, and – even when the D calms down – worrying about going anywhere in case his microscopic enemy decides to have a goofy old gurgle and go absolutely berserk out of the bloody blue!

 Bacteria are very small. So are viruses. And amoeba. And, yeah, mitochondria, too. (showing off memories of my high-school biology).

 Of course, I didn’t remind him of high school biology, or put the longer question to him, which I regretted as soon as I left the building, because isn’t that always the way? It is with me.

 I get that he’s not a gastroenterologist. I know he’s just a human, and that even if he’s a doctor/professor, he can’t know everything. And maybe he had brain fog from Covid, and who know, maybe he banged his head repeatedly on his desk the second I walked out of his office, feeling like a mega moron. In which case he should have come after me and said oops. And I’d have been ok with it.

But no.

 To add to that disastrous day with doctors, later on I had an appointment with the orthopaedic department at Geneva hospital concerning my hip and knee pain. I was seen by an intern who was approximately twelve and a half years old. His stethoscope was far too long and tripped him up (just kidding). Admin had failed to take my knee problem into account when they made the appointment, and this slightly bashful child hadn’t a clue about knees, but he obliged and poked at it for a bit. Which was nice, because he was cute, in a shy little boy sort of way with his dark floppy hair. And then he poked my hips a bit and shrugged and sent me on my grumpy way (although I smiled at him when I left. I’m nice). And then, oh yeah, some twit had forgotten to pay for his parking ticket when he got to the barrier, so I sat there behind him for about three days.

 Pfff!

 I stopped to do the shopping on the way home, and bought four pains au chocolat out of sheer frustration. Bear in mind that I have not touched a pain au chocolat in two years because of IBD, so it wasn’t the smartest move. But there you go. I only meant to eat one, but it was DELICIOUS, and so I thought eating a second one wouldn’t change much, because if I got sick, well I’d get sick from eating just the one, anyway, so I ate another.

 Well, I got VERY sick. Microscopic my ass!

 Later that night, I wrote a Haiku.

 COLOSSAL COLITIS

Microscopic, yes.

But with colossal effects.

Do not poo-poo this!

 

I’m calling it Colossal Colitis from now on.

 So there.