Home life
Creation myths
Alice Thomas Ellis
have a kind of alien living in my semiconscious like a mite in cheese. He emerges early in the mornings before I'm properly awake and gives me peculiar advice and instructions. Nothing useful like `Remember, it's six and three-quarter shopping days to Christmas', or 'You forgot to put the cat out last night', or 'You left your reading glasses on the third shelf in the pantry', but strange things. The other morning he was gibbering at me through the mists of sleep, insisting that I write a story about two archetypal charac- ters called Dumbeau and Dumbelle. It was to be a creation myth. Then I woke up and he retired backstage leaving me to work out the details. I did start on this story, but it's not the sort of thing that really interests me, so I shall have to wait for the mite to return with the full idea.
I hope he leaves it till after Christmas, . about which I have been unusually neglect- ful — i.e. I haven't started worrying about it yet. I'm usually in a state of collapse by 15 December but I am growing blasé. Janet has been plodding round acquiring pre- sents — mostly knitted things, because what else can you give men? — and wrapping them up. This exercise always reminds me of the bridal gown — some- thing which is put on only so that it can be taken off — and irritates me to the roots of my being. I really am becoming unhinged on the subject of packaging. I think I see it as prurient, and I hope I'm not inclining towards naturism. The climate is not con- ducive to unashamed nakedness, and I do not care for the sight of unclad creatures unless they're under 18 months of age or furry — chimpanzees, chipmunks, dor- mice, etc.
I have myself been unprecedentedly packaged for a few days: locked away in exile in a flat with every mod con so I can do some long-delayed work without inter- ruption. There are interruptions — the central heating turns itself on with a roar, the electric oven yelps, the extractor thing in the bathroom susurrates, the fridge sighs, but the phone seldom cheeps be- cause few people know where I am, and those that do don't seem to care. There's a blue tit in the berried bush below the window but I don't have to bird-watch it, and there's a very busybody dog who ranges round outside unceasingly, looking for something to stick his nose into. I haven't seen him sit down once.
I'm going back to the house tonight with 14 pages of MS. I didn't get the letters written, but then I never do. Janet's mended the fuse, and with any luck she'll have been to Waitrose and picked up the mince-pies, red currant jelly and all the packets of stuff that become necessary at this time. There isn't anywhere to put them because the shelf space is full. We'll have to edge round them until they get eaten up and then I'm going to run away again.
Off to the country, I think, where there are dozens of rooms and if anybody gets into a rage he can go and sulk by himself in the west wing. I'm not saying that anybody will. All I'm saying is if I wasn't alone in this wee flat I would eventually murder whoever was with me because I couldn't get away from them. There isn't even a potting shed. I'd never thought of that before. I've always had immediate access to the ground floor without having to fiddle with half a dozen keys. If the need arose I could always sweep out, slamming the door. Here you have to stop and lock several behind you. Easier to clobber the cause of offence and pop him down the waste disposal unit.
I can hear the squeak of the mite reminding me to pass on what he told me. He said having a pseudonym was a form of packaging, of disguise, like a wig. He said, `You're Alice Thomas Somebody Ellis so there.'
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