'Til the Landslide Brings You Down

I've tried to write this post a few times; most frequently in the early hours of the morning when stress turns into insomnia and rest cannot be bought with care nor medicine. When reading the drafts back however, they strike me more as entitled whining than updates and so they are edited, re-arranged, ultimately deleted. I don’t feel entitled to an easy life- and the 45 years I’ve had so far have taught me that hubris on this part frequently leads to disaster.

Still, I cannot avoid the truth, it has been a bruising few months. To deny it would be to minimise the struggle that keeping afloat (literally and metaphorically) has been. The relentless downpour of the last four months has robbed me both of the ability to work properly, and any sort of respite within the dark of night. Everything I own has leaked incessantly in the rain. Furniture and bedding have rotted, floorboards too. The stove fell to pieces at Christmas, and is now hanging on for dear life until the nights warm enough for it to be replaced. Cars and vans have expired, themselves tired of the endless workload. I too, began to break; echoing the depressing state of my current account- nothing left from which to draw. Lee Anderson thinks you can live on 30 pence a day; I’d like to see the sanctimonious prick try it.

Out here the floods have taken up permanent residency, along with our wonderful local Otters. The latter at least provide something to smile about on occasion. In our favour on the canal, the overtopping of the banks stops the water rising any further; those poor sods on the riverboats must have blood pressure like a tidal surge at the moment. There have been so many reports of sunken boats lately, if I didn’t already own a pair that have spent too long impersonating U-Boats, I’d grab myself a bargain.

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In amongst the winter closures, progress for Murphy’s Game has been stilted; and for the most part utterly bereft of comfort. We have consumed our own body weight in hot chocolate, passing the recently-boiled kettle between our icy hands in a vain attempt to encourage bloodflow back into fingertips. My prime spot on the back deck- positioned over the engine to harvest the meagre warm air draught- has been a closely guarded prize.

On a frigid Sunday afternoon we trundled down through the litter-strewn industrial suburbs of Nuneaton and round Coventry to Hawkesbury, to cross the stop lock at Sutton Cottage and finally onto the Oxford Canal, the supposed last leg of the journey.

‘It's all gravy from here' I nonchalantly reflected, whilst casually stopping to record some video of an electrical substation buzzing melodically to no-one in particular. Yet more storms followed, the near-constant squall now replaced by days of belting downpour which comes in icy, sapping sheets. The van completely self-destructed after it’s MOT test, then the Land Rover did the same just as it was going to be sold. My home boat sprung more leaks, and in my eroded state I began to let my guard fall a little, perhaps trusting that the blows would cease for a while.

They did not.

Within the space of three weeks I began to feel the signs of this battering season. By mid February I felt like I was in a standing count- blood dripping from loosened teeth as I swayed before the referee. More problems arise, the ceaseless onslaught of life. I've lived for 18 months without a bathroom, without a functioning kitchen. For six months without proper shelter from the weather. It begins to extract a toll eventually, when all efforts to move things along are thwarted by bad luck, happenstance, or poverty. It's a young man's game, wresting a life next to nothing, Still, if this is not a game for the faint-hearted, I cannot at least be accused of being faint-of-heart. Shoulder the load, Richard, shut up complaining. It’s how I was raised, and it’s why the retelling of it feels too close to whining for comfort.

I get support, perspective, encouragement. There are a couple of people here who routinely have my back when it begins to bend under the load. I am reminded that were I writing a book then this would be the trial; the part at which jeopardy is at it's highest shortly before the hero wins a final battle against apparently insurmountable odds. Here comes the garland, the riches, the adulation; they’re just over the brow of this hill, just round the next corner. Too frequently from here it just looks like another day in the rain, with the rage-making drip of water on a hardwood floor as soundtrack.

This is the reality of starting again; the day to day work of bringing a life from a cold start. Let's not beat about the bush; for every perfectly-arranged online off-grid advocate there is someone else shoving cushions into roof spaces to stem leaks. If anyone tells you it’s easy, they are selling you a fantasy.

It's not always this troublesome of course. When the sun shines, the wins seem not only possible, but inevitable. Winters like these do set all the weaknesses into bold relief, though. Troubles capillary up through minute gaps and drip onto the sleeping head.

This isn’t my first rodeo, however. I’ve done this many times, and often come out on top. I used to think it was a matter of willpower, but it’s as much money as anything else. When the rain finally abates at least the chances to generate more of that will grease the gears, or release the bronc, or whatever metaphor we are mangling now.

One more droplet gets through- this one an email. There is a landslide at Easenhall. The North Oxford Canal is closed for at least 2 months (read probably 3-4) while the engineers attempt what my grandad and his digger would have done in a fortnight without breaking a sweat- his terrier Jim stood on the doorplate barking instructions throughout. We are stranded, a lack of fuel in the van for a few days delaying the move just long enough to put me behind the problem instead of just in front of it. I have a free pass to stay put, but it’s a massive problem for the build.

Still, we will work around it.

I am as yet undecided as to the next move. I can sit it out and wait, let the clock run down and perhaps concentrate on getting something sorted to call home; or I can spin round and head north again, back into Staffordshire and then take a left to come through Castle Bromwich and down to Warwick on the Grand Union. It would give me chance to come back through Leamington- my old home town- but it’s a good week of solid boating and an extra 60-odd locks to make. The initial 10 week notice of closure is deceiving; that much of a stop isn’t disastrous at all really. But with this lot ‘10 weeks’ frequently turns into ‘20’, and if I stop and wait to see, I could end up wasting half a year. Perhaps it will come down to a coin toss, something nice and arbitrary to settle the debate. I do need to be careful though, the way things are if I drop the coin I’ll put my back out trying to pick it up…

We’ll pick up the thread on the coming posts, there is an anniversary to mark, and with an eye on what must be a soon-to-come change in season, there are plans afoot for the build.