Illuminations
I am lucky enough to have a room with a view. I look out across rooftops and a black metal tower used by the fire brigade next door to practice high rise evacuations, then across more rooftops to the gunmetal grey of the Thames estuary. At night, the lights of Sheppey flicker with a distant promise and if I turn my head a little, on the far horizon is Southend. I realise, that I’m not describing my room at all, but what’s outside. Inside, I’ve tried to recreate a cabinet of still life finds, similar to one I saw at Brantwood, John Ruskin’s house on Coniston Water. I’ve collected curious shells, animal bones, a small carved mouse and a fabric owl bought from a Christmas fayre. It’s not as good as Ruskin’s, but I find these objects comforting.
A cacophony of seagulls draws my eyes outwards again and back to the view, their black shapes silhouetted against a slowly bruising sky.
When I look towards Southend and Essex, the county of my birth, I watch a set of lights on the coastline turn from red to blue and back to red again. These lights pulse in a rhythm different to the other lights which merely blink. I tell myself (and others) that these lights are the illuminations on Southend pier. I watched these lights flash on and off all through the long nights of lockdown, attempting to write before succumbing to Yoga with Adriene to calm my mind before sleep. I wondered who was there to appreciate the pier’s illuminations, pulsing as they were with the promise of gaiety, frivolity, abandon. The grind of bumper cars, scream of the waltzer, head spinning and taste of toffee apple rising to the back of your throat. The pier was empty, locked up, off limits, so who were these lights for? And then I realised they were there for me.
Caroline Millar is a second year PhD candidate in Text, Research and Practice at the Centre for Creative Writing at the University of Kent where she is writing a novel inspired by walking the Thames Estuary.
https://www.kent.ac.uk/english/people/3293/millar-caroline
twitter: @carolinejmillar