This is the first day of the rest of my life. I’d woken about six, well just after. Simon was sleeping spooned around me, I was lying on my right side–apparently, if you’re physically tired you sleep on the right, mentally on the left. I don’t know if I believe it, there is so much bad science around these days. Mima hadn’t yet crawled into our bed, though I suspected it wouldn’t be long before she did.

I relaxed, lying on my side, feeling Simon’s arm around me and his warm body behind. It was lovely, they say the best things in life are free, they are, it’s just usually we don’t appreciate them until it’s too late, often after the event. So I was enjoying this while it lasted. I was also thinking about yesterday and the bedlam of Christmas, which astonishingly worked pretty much as I planned it–or was that despite my plans? Either way, it worked.

Mima, when she stopped running scared of trees, or just one in particular, thoroughly enjoyed herself, opening everyone’s presents and eating the dog’s choc drops–how could she? Oh I forgot to tell you about that, well, I’ll spare you the detail, but Kiki would have been signally miffed had she ever found out. I’ll have to get her some more when I can. It’s funny, we buy choc drops for dogs, but they aren’t chocolate, they’re carob, chocolate is poisonous to dogs and cats.

Enough of the soap box, I reflected on my Christmas day and it could have been worse, much worse. In fact I have spent worse ones, one or two in relatively recent years, though not the last couple.

Then I thought of our visit to the cemetery. I found goose-bumps rising on my arms even though Simon’s warm body was still wrapped around the back of me. I had definitely felt a sense of approval at the graveside, what I mean by this I don’t know. It’s like a sort of sixth sense, perhaps some form of primitive system which we haven’t discovered yet. It happens in some forms of blindness, if the eyes aren’t damaged they set up alternative pathways in the brain, or use primitive ones which means that some people who have a particular form of blindness can still detect movement. It’s weird.

So what did I detect? I don’t know other than a sense of something positive, like knowing that someone is thinking well of you even though they might be miles away. I used to make them laugh at Sussex, they used to call me Mystic Meg–after the scurrilous astrologer in the News of the World, because I would know when a letter was going to arrive from my mother. Daddy hardly ever wrote and I didn’t pick up on those anyway. My mother used to write irregularly, so there was no pattern. I even tried to find one, thinking it was something I was unconsciously counting, except it wasn’t.

In my final year, I shared a house with three girls, they only took me because they thought I was gay or effeminate and used to call me Meg occasionally because I would just say in the middle of breakfast, “I’m going to get a letter from Mum today.” Sure enough it would be there by lunch time.

I read a bit about people being ‘out of time’ not in the sense they’d just breathed their last, but that their consciousness was not in normal linear time. It sort of explained precognitive dreams and so on, sort of. I didn’t believe it until one morning I dreamt I won the lottery, and I saw the numbers on the ticket. Of course, I awoke with a wonderful buzz which lasted for hours. I bought a lottery ticket, not the numbers I’d seen, but a lucky dip. Of course the numbers came up, the ones from my dream, I’d written them down.

It was an amazing experience, realising that something as random as lottery numbers could be seen precognitively in a dream. It showed me beyond any doubt that time wasn’t always linear. Or that humans can sometimes be ahead of it. Oh the four million I’d have won, okay it could have helped a lot of dormice, but the experience was wonderful in itself, and what you’ve never had you can’t lose.

So is there life after death? I have no idea, part of me would like it to be so if only so we could see our loved ones again. Another part of me sees it as more likely to be wishful thinking and fears of our own mortality. I still don’t know and probably won’t this side of my own funeral. But if it helps Tom get through the day, I won’t knock it, though I’m not sure I’ll be up the cemetery with him too often, pushes too many buttons.

“Mummy,” I felt a tap on my arm and a little body clambered in beside me. She felt a bit cold, so I cuddled her against me and she soon warmed up. Thankfully she dozed for an hour, so I could have cogitated some more, except I snoozed too. I’d obviously done enough thinking for one day.

Boxing Day, got underway a little after seven when Mima woke up properly and refused to go back to sleep. We left Simon in bed and went for some breakfast, then it was back to normal, I vacuumed through and put on a load of washing, it’s amazing how that has increased with one small child who disproportionately uses up washing facilities. I do quite a few things by hand, a real pain, but some of my delicates and Mima’s nicest dresses, are too risky to put in the machine.

I’d washed the two dresses she’d worn recently, the one she wore for the court and the one she had on yesterday. I hung them on the line, although I wasn’t too hopeful they’d dry. They didn’t, I had to finish them in the drier.

Tom walked Kiki and took trouble with him, they went to feed the ducks and someone came back covered in mud–I cannot for the life of me understand what happened, but I managed to laugh rather than shout at Tom. I also took an hour to get her clothes clean again.

While Tom was out, I persuaded Simon to get off his big fat bum and come for a ride with me. We only did about ten miles and were both knackered. It’s weeks since I last rode and did I know it. It took ten minutes to pump the tyres up, so that shows you how things were.

Back home, I showered and was drying my hair when Tom brought Mima back looking like an unbaked brick. I whipped her in the bath and once dry, did her hair in two pig tails. She spent the rest of the day in her dungarees. Tom had to wash Kiki, which served him right–once she knew what was coming, he had to chase her around the garden before he could do it. I had very little sympathy, especially with my sore hands after all the hand washing.

For lunch we had turkey left overs, I did a salad, then for dinner, I did curry for those who wanted it, everyone except Mima and me. We had turkey jacket potatoes, yeah okay, hardly inspiring but it filled a hole. Tom was pleased with his curry, so I made someone’s day.

We watched a bit of telly, Mima played with her dolls and other toys and I checked my emails. One in particular caught my eye. It was from Janice Scott.

“Hi Cathy,
I hope you all had a good Christmas. I’ve run into a few problems here so it might be some time before I can look after Jemima again, so I would appreciate your looking after her for an indefinite period. I hope she’s settled in with you, I’m pretty sure she would and that you’d make every effort to see she did. You’re a good un, a regular angel. Give my love to ‘our’ daughter, she must feel as much yours as mine by now. Look after her won’t you, and enjoy her, she’s a good kid.
Thanks,
Janice (Scott).

I printed it off, it came from a gmail address, so no chance of tracing it. I was sure it was genuine, but I couldn’t prove it. I showed it to Simon, Stella and Tom. They had mixed feelings and were split about me telling Mima. I ignored their advice and told her anyway.

“Meems, your real mummy sent an email, to say happy Christmas.”

“You, my mummy. Caffy my mummy.”

“No, your mummy before me, Mummy Janice. She sent you this email.” I handed it to the child.

“I no wike, Mummy Janice, I wuv, Mummy Caffy.” Then she tore up the email.

“Don’t be too hard on her, Meems, we don’t know what she’s going through at the moment, but I do know she’ll be missing you. I would if we were separated and I’ve only had you a few weeks. She had you a lot longer, so she’ll be very sad.”

“Mima vewy sad too, Mummy Janice weft Mima, Mima no wike her. She bad wady.”

“Okay, Kiddo, don’t get upset, I’m not going to abandon you nor is Simon, Tom or Stella. We all love you loads and loads.” I hugged her and she cried a bit but not a great deal.

I did feel for Janice, I wondered what had happened, was she in prison or was she still fighting her case or on the run somewhere? I had no doubt that she selected me carefully as someone who'd look after Mima safely. I also had no doubts that she didn’t give her up easily, but it was a percentage play to reduce risks on Mima. I was just a safe pair of hands, who was dumb enough to get involved.

However, with her little body clasped to mine, and her need for love and protection and mine to give it, I had no regrets, absolutely none.