Plan

It is stunningly beautiful here. I sit on the terrace in the mornings when everyone else is still asleep, watching the sun come up and the mist burn off the surface of the sea. The mountains emerge slowly, magnificently, from the haze across the channel and it is so quiet I can hear the lemons and figs plopping from the trees into the long grass of the orchard behind. House martins swoop down to drink from the swimming pool, joined memorably one morning by a proud, strutting jay.

The regular world and its concerns seem to have no relevance here, a place where wealth is measured by the number of olive trees; the length of a walk is measured by the number of cigarettes; the temperature is measured by the noise of the crickets and the beauty of a girl is measured by the thickness of her hair and the heaviness of her breasts. Sunshine, fresh air, good food, slow life are gradually working their magic on me.

September always feels much more like the time for things to start afresh. January is so cold and miserable and bleak. Coming back after the summer break seems like the right time to begin new plans, make resolutions, try a different approach. For more than half my life, autumn has been the time for change, and it’s a hard habit to break, it’s woven deep into the fabric.

I have had time to think, to mull, to ponder, to consider. I have determined that my experiment to live life outside the submarine has not worked out well. All this being open, being in touch with my emotions, saying what I feel, has occasionally had some wonderful benefits, but it has left me feeling vulnerable and exposed, wide open to hurt that would have glanced off and left me untouched if I had been safely inside my protective shell. It has reminded me why I built my submarine in the first place.

A second lesson I have learned from the experience is that no-one actually wants to know how you really feel. It’s too complicated, too dangerous, too difficult. They start to worry about what it might mean for them. There’s a kind of horror as if you’ve pulled the skin from your face - people don’t really want to see all the workings inside.

Finally I realised that you can be as open and bare as you like, but other people still keep their boundaries, regardless. For sure, there are a few who will let you get closer, share things that perhaps they wouldn’t generally, but there remain walls and secrets and barriers that must not be crossed. I am conclude there is general consensus that everyone should stay in their armour so the business of life can be transacted neatly, properly and without unseemly emotional seepage. Peep under the visor occasionally, if you’re careful.

So I am returning home by submarine. All shiny and new, fitting as closely as a second skin, painted to look just like me. You might never notice it’s there, unless you know me well. But it will be bolted firmly closed, and I will be invulnerable to the autumn and the winter, and everything will be fine.