Let Me Make You a Pie
It's the season for comfort food & red wine
It’s dark before 5pm now. October brought endless rain. The caravan park flooded. The river burst its banks. The road between here and civilisation (as we like to say) closed due to landslides. And yet, I’m so happy autumn is here with her shorter days and her icy wind and her constant rain. It’s time for turning inward, for getting cosy, for reading more. For knitting hats. For spending hours making meals far heartier and warmer than those we made in the summer.
I’m crying while I’m writing. (Not this newsletter! Don’t you worry! You won’t get tears all in your morning coffee reading this. But, rather, I’m crying while writing a story.)
I’m not sure why I find little tears rolling down my cheeks on this occasion. Just a few tears, not proper sobs or anything. Like when your eyes leak but you’re not quite on board with the crying - like crying in a cinema, when you’re trying not to attract attention or disturb the other cinemagoers. Maybe the character I’m patiently describing - the curve of their smile, the way they adjust themselves in the seat, the way they blow their nose - reminds me too much of someone now gone from this earth. Maybe the music playing through the speaker pulls at some loose threads in my body that are attached to some unhealed memory. Maybe I’m really happy and I can’t quite figure out how to feel that feeling without crying. Maybe it’s overwhelm. Hormones. Lack of sleep. A glass of wine on an empty stomach.
Whatever it is, this feeling I feel, I find myself crying while you’re cooking.
I’m at the laptop, peeling words from my fingers like peeling PVA glue from my hands in primary school. So satisfying. Sticky.
You’re making pie. Chicken and leek pie. I asked if you would, said I’d been dreaming of autumn dinners, of stews and roasts and potato-rich meals. I made a broccoli soup the other day, dipped bread into it and felt it warm my bones. I’ve started wearing fingerless gloves while I work at my laptop and now I need a hot water bottle on my feet at all hours and a hot tea in hand to match.
We’ve been together for five years now. I find myself getting sentimental. We looked at some old photos of ourselves together the other day, of the younger us. Laughed as we remembered different things, these checkpoints within our lives. Over these five years we’ve woven a life together that looks more beautiful as each day passes, a safety that can only be found with a love built so tenderly by time, that when you walk in the door each night I feel, at once, at home. I find myself watching you cook and I notice this peace. The depth within knowing someone. My laptop glows; the story peers back at me, at me watching you, at you making pie.
It’s so dark outside.
Autumn has arrived just in time to relieve me of a summer almost too full, too active, too extravagant. Rich in adventure and the simple joys of shared barbeques and lukewarm beers by the water. I’m turning inwards now, soaking up the daylight hours via woolly-hat walks, peeling wet socks off to hang dry by the gas fire when I get back. Watching the sunset in pink stripes, the hills black and the sky glowing behind their lumpy forms. Sleeping giants above the loch. Red squirrels dart between even redder leaves and I’ve been happy to dig out warmer coats and wear multiple layers before I even open the front door.
This time of year calls for listening to the rain on the roof, the patter of it on the windows, wishing I didn’t have to get up from the plump warmth of a duvet still sweaty from sleep. Whenever I get home I find the caravan smells like damp. And curry. And suspiciously mushroom-y, as if there’s a small forest of mycelium forming just under a cushion or in one of the plant pots.
“Why are you crying,” you ask, confused when I wander over for a hug, for a wine top-up, for a kiss. For a little slipper-dance. Hopeful to enjoy some pie mix before it goes in the oven with its neat little pastry hat. I tell you I don’t know, which is true. I wipe little tiny tears from their curious place on my cheeks. I’m smiling, laughing at the absurdity of tears without a source. Maybe these are happy tears, maybe my eyes needed a little clean, maybe the story I’m writing has finally eaten me whole and now I’m just crying because that’s what writing is, for me - some kind of therapy, a catharsis, a work that consumes me and spits me back out all tired and befuddled.
I remember one night - back when I was a student for that brief moment in time - in my student halls I spent an odd, isolated evening. In a small bedroom on the third floor, I chugged a can of Red Bull and decided to stay up until 4am writing. A tactic I’d decided might act as the catalyst to a breakthrough. I was in a rut. A ‘what-next?’ A should-I-quit-university conundrum? I’d skipped classes for three days - the excuse of fresher’s flu now getting a little over-used a month into the university year.
I remember keeping the window open and listening to the music that travelled from the other student halls. Twirling around in the plastic chair at my desk. Listening to the laughter of two people smoking below, of the wheels rumbling over the tarmac from the skateboarder in the small alleyway my window looked out onto. I think I wanted to recreate that mad catharsis that I can never quite force myself into; that rare time when the world drips away and it’s just me, driven by something unnameable, writing something that will likely never see the light of day, knitting together ideas and glimpses of lives so far from my own, stories a little too similar to my worst nightmares or my biggest dreams.
While you cook, I write over a thousand words. I don’t usually write this much this fast. Hence maybe why the tears fall? Maybe why I feel like I’ve reached that high that I’d tried to use sleep deprivation and Red Bull and an open window to achieve years ago. I keep three books on the table by me at all times, as if the words within them will permeate my brain. An osmosis of book-to-laptop.
Autumn is my writing retreat. The shorter days, the stormy weather, the invitation to spend more time inside, under a blanket, lighting candles and eating chocolate and drinking room temperature drinks like red wine and whisky. The quiet of dark autumn evenings invites an inward turning. A chance to reflect. My stories enter strange territory. Ghosts in the baking cupboard. Selkies under a full moon. Fairies in the attic.
We eat dinner and drink more wine and I’m reminded of the first time you cooked for me. Sausage and mash. A mad dash to make it on your split-shift, socked feet on a grimy carpet, enthusiastic portions on too-small plates. It’s funny how we repeat and repeat and repeat. We take walks. We make food. We wash dishes. And somewhere along the line things get comfortable. Not comfortable in a boring way. Comfortable in a way that’s safe. Little layers that only time can place on top of one another. A lasagna we’ve taken time to make, if you will. Some broken pasta sheets. A rich sauce…
I’ll stop the metaphor there. It’s getting out of hand and I’m getting hungry.
Looks like it’s time to put something hearty and spicy to simmer on the stove.
My dad’s always said ‘poem’ like this. “Poyum.” I thought he was just doing a dad-thing. Turns out it’s actually quite legit. It’s Scots.
So enjoy a lovely, tasty ‘poyum’ each month.
TO READ: I always love to share a short story with you, but instead, this month I’d strongly recommend you go and pick up that book that you bought and haven’t read yet. We’ve all done it. It’s the perfect month for pulling out one of your I’ll-read-that-one-day books and actually reading it.
(And if you don’t want to do that, then go ahead, buy a new book. Or read an old favourite. Just read something. It’s good for the soul.)
TO LISTEN: This album is living in my brain on repeat. Enjoy.
TO WATCH: For me, this season is all about cosying up and watching my comfort films. If you haven’t already seen it, please watch Hunt For The Wilderpeople. I come back to it time and time again. (And if you have seen it, then this is your excuse to watch it again.)
Dance in the kitchen a little while you listen.
I mentioned in my last newsletter, but I’ve been deep in Scottish folklore research, and I thought it might be nice to share a little folklore with you each month! So this month, read a curious story about the infamous Cara Brownie here.
Fun fact: Belief in Brownies was very common even into the 1930s, and many highlanders would leave out a bowl of milk for the house Brownie to ensure their farm and home were well maintained by this mysterious yet fairly friendly hobgoblin.
Beautiful letters from other to others.
And again, thank you! Thank you for reading this, for spending some time indulging me and my brain. Next month will be the last newsletter of the year, which is hard to wrap my head around. I’ve got big plans for 2024, so I’d love if you share this newsletter with someone you think might enjoy it!
I’ll be in your inbox again on the first Sunday of the month with more musings.
