We slept for twelve whole hours, and felt unimaginably better.
I didn’t bother doing my relaxation exercises this morning, because they were dull and anyway they didn’t work yesterday. I just went straight for the drugs. They worked today as well.
Lucy had gone off to work to bring flowery happiness to the world. She has become very enthusiastic indeed about this occupation, especially since she discovered that she was going to be paid £7.50 per hour. We have all been doing mental arithmetic since she came home with that news, by the end of the summer she will be able to pay her own school fees.
We wrapped ourselves up in seasonal layers and layers of vests and jumpers and scarves, and went off to the farm where we carried on with our habitual occupation of doing things to the camper van. This is at the slow and fiddly stage, Mark is putting the cab back together.
I think that this is is frustrating, because he has got to do a lot of things which are only cosmetic and won’t make any difference to getting it on the road quickly. It is tiresome to be spending ages wiring up the radio and putting speakers in, and feels like a waste of time, but of course he has got to do these things whilst the dashboard is in bits. If he didn’t do it now then there would come a future sad day when we would have to remove the whole dashboard, when we suddenly decided to fit a radio because we wanted to listen to The Archers on our holidays and discovered that we couldn’t.
He has taken the cab ceiling out today. He has put lots of insulating foam up behind it, and some glue to stop things rattling, and the wiring for the speakers. After that he carefully covered the ceiling panel in suede so that he can put it back tomorrow. This feels excitingly sophisticated, it will be smooth and clean and lovely. I suppose it will make the cab feel a bit dark, because it is the same dark brown suede that we used for the dashboard, but I think that will be all right, because it will be like having our own safe cave to hide in.
I have finished painting pictures on the two sides of the van, after weeks and weeks, what a huge project that has been. I finished the joke bit where it looks as though the windows are hanging on strings and propped up on a stick, and then added three mice and a token wood louse this afternoon and it was done.
All that is left to do now is the front of the van, which is going to have Oliver’s octopus and some other sea creatures on it. This will complete the camouflaged stealth nature of the van, because then we will be able to hide even when we go to the seaside, you will hardly notice us at all.
Also I have got to spray it with lacquer, because it is acrylic paint, and not waterproof, and I wouldn’t like it all to dribble off when it rains. I think I am going to do this next, actually, because although it doesn’t rain into Mark’s shed, at least not in the bit where the camper van is, there are an awful lot of passing birds, and it would be a bit depressing if one had an accident on it before it was lacquered, because it would be very difficult to wash it off.
We felt quite satisfied when we reached this stage, and went home to eat pasta before work, and listen to Lucy’s stories of scrubbing out vases and sweeping up leaves.
She has got to go back to school for a couple of days next week, for Sports Day and the end of term. It is going to feel very odd after being gainfully employed.
Also I had better iron her uniform.
