to all that

Woke up with the most terrible nightmare. It's been years since I woke up crying but two coffees later, I realised that the sum of my nightmares was death by smoke. An old woman surrounded by loved ones waiting for her to die. There are incense sticks, as around a dead body, but in this instance, the body is alive and we are waiting for her to die. Presumably, by inhaling incense. One time, she coughed but someone gave her water. That diluted the poison.

I shouldn't have watched Pratchett's documentary on assisted dying. I shouldn't have mentally signed off a note I was composing, with the words exit, pursued by luggage nightmares.

It is time for me to leave. When I arrive, I hope the rains will be a conveyor belt that took me from here to there without my having noticed. It is a slow leaving and a slow arrival. All things are possible.