Feeling Lost

There is a train station, only two streets over from us and you have to flag the train if you want it to stop. How quaint! Not nearly as quaint as Calstock which is fast becoming one of my favorite places and perhaps where I should like to live when I’m earning big money.

It is lush; heavy with foliage, rich with the river, ripe with character and steeped in history. It is the sort of place that seems as though every other house homes an eccentric ghost.

On previous visits, we have taken country paths, and gotten lost, we have gone blackberry picking and gotten lost, one occasion we had the dog with us and got lost. 

This time the boy and I decided to walk from Calstock up to Cotehele house. A glorious walk if ever there was one. I believe the boy was having jungle fantasies as he clambered among the giant foliage. I was hoping for inspiration for a story on the theme of Haptics and instead found that I was happily vacant, thinking of nothing, nothing but peace, the kind of peace you expect to find on holiday. Until we got lost.

It was towards the end of our full day and neither of us could recall how we came upon the house. We followed a steep hill, saw the sign and walked in. Which way was the steep hill? Panic set in. I could see the viaduct in the distance, but how to get there?

View down into Calstock, we needed to get to the Viaduct.

I ranted to the boy for a bit then asked people, which way to Calstock? Several pointed us in the wrong direction,  it could not be along the tarmac road because we didn’t come up that way we came up a hill. No one seemed to know about the hill. Eventually we followed the complex directions of a man who orchestrated the way with his walking stick. We remained unconvinced until we found three people also walking to Calstock, we were on the right road and suddenly everything felt safe, Ah yes we said look there is the bench I rested at, there is the place he found the big stick. We would have plenty of time to catch the train, we would even have time for the pub!

Today, I am again feeling lost. My holiday is rapidly running away from me and I have achieved so little. The bathroom is still not complete. The park project is only barley begun, the piece of flash fiction still on the lap top, the ironing pile imposing. Other than this blog entry and the dishes I have achieved nothing today. The world is heavy with directions. I must have a routine, I must write every day, I must do morning pages, meditate, share, publicise, enter competitions, short stories, novels, and now suddenly I have decided a graphic novel might be a good idea.

I suppose what I’m looking for is the break through, that acknowledgement that I am on the right path, that not only will I be able to get there, but there will be time to do the ironing too.