Counting Sheep by Jenny Palmer, Chamomile tea

The fog was starting to clear. The sheep were on the move. The farmer must be about. He would be bringing them theirdaily rations of sheep nuts to keep them going through the winter. Julia loved watching them. Fat with lambs, they ran in single file to assemble as a flock in the spot where he would dole out the feed. Some stragglers made up the rear. They were the ones who were going to have twins or triplets.  Once they’d eaten, most of the sheep would lie down and chew the cud. It was a sign that they were contented and well-fed. One of them just stood there, staring into space. What was it thinking? she wondered. Did sheep think?

Sometimes she wished she could stop thinking. Turn her brain off. Be more sheep. She was feeling sleep-deprived, having lain awake half the night watching YouTube videos and listening to podcasts. It was her own fault. She needed to take herself in hand again. She’d had these bouts of insomnia before.

As an asthmatic child, when she couldn’t breathe, she would cry out in the night for her mother to come, to give her a pill and rub her back. The attack would be over in twenty minutes or so and her mother would leave, telling her to count sheep. She liked to imagine the sheep jumping over a fence one by one, even though it was not in their nature to jump, except when they were lambs. But it was easier to count them that way. She rarely got to a hundred.

Insomnia was a real bind especially when you had to get up in the morning. The more you tried, the less you were ableto nod off. And she’d tried everything over the years: chamomile tea, cutting out caffeine, not drinking alcohol, going to bed earlier, mindfulness, meditation. Nothing seemed to work. Sometimes she’d get up, make a cup of tea, and readuntil she dropped off, but the house was too cold for that in winter. She’d end up turning on the radio to distract herself. It hadn’t exactly been comforting listening to the BBC World Service and following all the trouble spots around the globe.But at least it had been educational.

Since she’d retired, she’d embraced the new technologies. Nowadays she turned on her tablet to watch films, podcasts, and YouTube videos in bed at night. She liked to feel in touch with the world and hear the various analyses about what was going on behind the scenes. Nighttime was her favourite time of day, a time when she could absorb new information, learn something. And what with Netflix, Primeand Sky Atlantic, she was never short of anything to watch. But of late it was becoming a problem. Teenagers weren’t the only ones addicted to technology.    

Ever since that unhinged, demented, real estate manfrom reality TV had got into power in the US again, things had gone downhill. He was dismantling the rule-based international order. The whole world was living in a state of anxiety, watching his every move. The number of political podcasts had grown exponentially, and it was getting harder and harder to keep up.   She knew missing sleep was an unhealthy habit to get into. Research showed that lack of sleep caused all sorts of health problems. It could even shorten your life. That was something else to worry about.

How could she break the habit? It occurred to her one night that she could only allow herself to fall asleep once she’d found someone or something that gave her hope. Hope that the war in Ukraine might end, hope that there would be a political solution for the conflict in Gaza, or that nations might unite to combat climate change. Something to indicate thatthe world was not falling into chaos and that things would right themselves eventually. It was a hard ask. 

All this searching was sending her brain into overdrive. Not only was she over-tired but over-stimulated, making it impossible to sleep. If the world’s biggest brains couldn’t sort it out, how could she? She had been looking for answers where there were none. No one could tell her things would get better. The truth was it could go either way. Better to concentrate on the people and places around her, focus on them. Better to accept her limitations, like the Serenity Prayer said, and stop worrying. 

She managed to allow herself to fall asleep that night and didn’t wake up till after eleven. By the time she got up, the sheep had already congregated by the gate and were contentedly chewing the cud.  

About the author

Jenny Palmer writes short stories, poetry, memoir and family history. Her collections 'Keepsake and Other Stories.' 2018, and 'Butterflies and Other Stories,' 2024, were published by Bridge House, and are on Amazon. 'Witches, Quakers and Nonconformists,' 2022, is sold at the Pendle Heritage Centre, Barrowford

Did you enjoy the story? Would you like to shout us a coffee? Half of what you pay goes to the writers and half towards supporting the project (web site maintenance, preparing the next Best of book etc.)

Winds of Change by Jenny Palmer, lime cordial,

Kate hadn’t even noticed the beech trees an hour earlier when she’d been on her way to the doctor’s. Her mind had been elsewhere. All she could think about then was getting there on time. The appointment was at 8.30 a.m. It was unfortunate timing because it clashed with the arrival of the school buses which were offloading pupils all down the road, making it difficult to overtake.

As it happened there was time to spare, time to read the paper she’d bought on the way in. It was full of news about the Cop30 climate summit taking place in Brazil. The world’s biggest polluters weren’t even there. Trump had long ago withdrawn from the Paris climate agreement, and India and China were conspicuous by their absence.

‘Typical,’ she said out loud. The woman next to her seemed to be nodding in agreement.

‘Just as the Secretary General of the United Nations announces that the world is about to miss its target of reducing temperatures to 1.5 degrees Centigrade above preindustrial levels, Bill Gates sees fit to step in and claim that it’s time to stop worrying about carbon dioxide emissions and focus instead on relieving world poverty.’

There was no response from the woman this time, but it helped to vent so she carried on.

‘He’s no better than the other tech oligarchs, who want to further their own interests and increase their profits by prolonging the use of oil and fossil fuels to power their AI data centres. They seem to think that climate change can be dealt with by technological solutions, rather than by garnering political will.’

The woman’s name was called out, and she left in a hurry.

It had been a long wait for this appointment. Kate had tried not to read too much into it, but her anxiety had only increased in the meantime. It felt like her world depended on the results. But it was good news. The doctor had reassured her there was nothing serious to worry about. She was elated. All she wanted to do was get home, have a coffee, take it in.

On her way back, she was struck by the sight of beech trees just past where the old community hospital used to stand, before they knocked it down and turned it into houses. The leaves on the other trees in the vicinity had been blown off in heavy gales the weekend before. Only the beech leaves remained. They were floating down to join the carpet of leaves on the road. The colours ranged from auburn to burnt orange and were set against a grey, cloud-ridden sky, giving the impression of a Pizarro or an early Van Gogh.

Who’d had the foresight to plant beech trees in that particular spot and for what purpose? She wondered. Were they put there as a windbreak, or to obscure the ugly cement works across the way? But the hospital was originally built as a workhouse, and it was unlikely that anyone had been considering the sensitivity of its inhabitants. Hopefully, the residents in the new houses appreciated the trees. They would have to go a long way to find anything quite so resplendent.

Once home, she sat down with a coffee. The news was all doom and gloom. She didn’t want to become a doomster. That was what climate change deniers had taken to calling climate activists these days, to try to minimize the seriousness of the problem, and make people think there was nothing they could do. It was important to stay optimistic. She’d go for a walk in the afternoon, up to the crossroads to sit on her bench. That would do the trick.

She’d first started calling it her bench  during Covid. It was in the early days when the population was being fed all sorts of misinformation about the virus. The bench was just past the crossroads in the middle of nowhere, miles from the nearest town. After a mile uphill it was always a relief to have a sit down, until that day when she’d been unceremoniously turfed off it by an over-fastidious policeman in a patrol car, who was adamant that the virus could last up to seventy-two hours on a hard surface. Ever since then it had served as a reminder of just where a lack of scientific knowledge got us.

Kate plonked herself down on the bench. Sitting at 1,000 feet above sea level, looking across a beautiful valley, gave her a different perspective on life. What was needed was a sea change in society, she thought, like the one that happened in the 60s, when Harold Wilson enacted Macmillan’s ‘winds of change’ speech, which he’d made to highlight  the end of the British Empire, or the sea change in Europe in 1989, made famous by the Scorpions’ song, when the Berlin Wall came down, heralding the end of the Cold War and the demise of the Soviet Union. 

But which way would the winds blow this time? These climate change deniers and minimisers couldn’t keep ignoring the scientific evidence, or the evidence of their own eyes when it was staring them in the face. You only had to look at the forest fires burning in the Amazon, or Australia or California, see the floods and storms increasing in Europe and the Philippines. In Jamaica, Hurricane Melissa was a testament to the danger of rapidly rising temperatures at sea level, that could whip up a colossal tropical storm and wreak devastation in minutes.

Thankfully, she wasn’t the only one who thought so. A host of Indigenous leaders, scientists, environmental activists, and forest defenders, along with representatives from 195 countries from around the world, had gathered together in Brazil to discuss how to preserve the planet. They weren’t giving up.

As she walked back home, the sun was just setting. The sky was streaked in pink and white clouds and there was a rosy glow spreading across the valley. And in the West, there was a golden globe, as the sun disappeared behind the horizon. The colours reminded her of the beech trees she’d seen in the morning. 

About the author

Jenny Palmer writes short stories, poetry, memoir and family history. Her collections 'Keepsake and Other Stories.' 2018, and 'Butterflies and Other Stories,' 2024, were published by Bridge House, and are on Amazon. 'Witches, Quakers and Nonconformists,' 2022, is sold at the Pendle Heritage Centre, Barrowford. 

Did you enjoy the story? Would you like to shout us a coffee? Half of what you pay goes to the writers and half towards supporting the project (web site maintenance, preparing the next Best of book etc.)

Mind Maps by Jenny Palmer, a half of Wainwright's

 

‘I’ve found the perfect walk for us,’ Celia said. ‘It’s a village circular. And it’s only three miles long. I’ve downloaded the relevant section of the ordnance survey map from the internet. We’ll be fine so long as we stick to the instructions in the guide. If you can read out the guide notes, I’ll follow them on the map. What can possibly go wrong?’

This new venture was Celia’s idea. She’d recently read an article in the newspaper which claimed that being organized, active and helpful not only made you a better person, but it also helped you to live longer.

 Monica was sceptical about the theory.

‘How could it work?” she said. ‘Surely, physical health is more important. I wonder how much research they did.’

‘That’s such a typical response from someone of your disposition,’ said Celia.

‘What’s that supposed to mean?’ asked Monica.

‘Well, you know: moody, anxious.’

‘I’m not moody,’ said Monica. ‘I’m realistic, that’s all.

 Celia and Monica had met some years before in a walking group, but recently when younger, more agile members had joined, they had been finding it harder and harder to keep up. Gone were the day of walking seven or eight miles. These days they were lucky to manage five.

‘So which way do we go?’ said Celia.

Turn right after the pub and follow the road until you come to the waymarker on the left. Continue along the road until you come to a fingerpost on your right. Then go over a small bridge and through a kissing gate. and continue along the fence line. Monica read

‘What’s a waymarker or a fingerpost?’ Monica asked. ‘And who wrote this guide, anyway? Why don’t they just say signposts? Trying to follow these instructions is doing my head in. It’s taking all the pleasure out of the walk.’

‘Don’t worry about them, then,’ said Celia, undeterred. ‘I’m sure we’ll find the footpath in the end. How hard can it be?’

They continued up the road for some time without deviating. It was a narrow country road. The hedges on both sides had grown so high over the summer that you couldn’t see over the top of them. Their conversation had slowed to a minimum.

‘Not much of a view,’ said Monica. ‘Come on, admit it. We are lost.’

 ‘We are not lost, I assure you,’ said Celia. ‘How can we get lost? So long as we stay on the road, we can’t go far wrong.’

‘Well, we are not on the footpath for one thing and there’s nothing to look at. To my mind, half the pleasure is looking at the views.’

‘I’ll tell you one thing,’ said Celia. ‘It’s a whole lot easier being led than doing the leading. Now I really appreciate the work our walk leaders put in. They recce every walk beforehand, just so we can follow behind and complain if they go wrong.’

‘Well, they are not here now,’ said Monica. ‘I think we should retrace our steps and go back to the pub.’

 ‘That’s just boring,’ said Celia. ‘Where’s your sense of adventure? I’ve got a better idea. Let’s take a short cut through the fields.’

 ‘Are you mad?’ said Monica. ‘That’s asking for trouble.’

 But before she knew it, Celia had taken off into the fields.

‘Just follow me,’ she shouted back. ‘I’ll soon get us onto the right path.’

By now Celia was ploughing along a path which looked as if it hadn’t been used in years. It was waist high in thistles and nettles. And against her better judgment, Monica found herself doggedly following behind. At the far end of the path there was a five-barred gate with no sign of a stile anywhere in sight. Celia was clambering over the gate, which was so rickety it looked like it might collapse at any moment.

‘I’ll leave it to you to explain to the farmer that we’ve broken his gate,’ Monica shouted.

 ‘Oh. Don’t be so negative,’ said Celia.

‘I don’t suppose you’ve even seen that herd of cattle there in the next field,’ Monica responded.

‘Don’t mind them. They haven’t got any calves, and we haven’t got a dog. They’ll leave us alone,’ said Celia.

‘Okay. This is as far as I go,’ said Monica. ‘I’ll see you back at the pub.’                                

‘So, what happened?’ Monica asked when Celia finally arrived back at the pub.

‘Well, you never said anything about there being a bull in the field, did you? It made a beeline for me and the rest of the herd followed in pursuit. I had to make a run for it and just managed to reach the wall in time, but my blood pressure had shot up and I collapsed. When I came to, there was a farmer shooing the cattle away and pointing to the Beware the Bull sign.’

‘You were lucky he was there. You could have been killed,’ said Monica. ‘I thought we were trying to prolong our lives, not shorten them. Didn’t that article say something about being organized and helpful, as well as active?’

‘You’re right,’ Celia conceded. ‘It’s down to you to sort out the next walk.’ 

 

About the author

   

Jenny Palmer writes short stories, poetry, memoir and family history. Her collections Keepsake and Other Stories' 2018, and 'Butterflies and Other Stories' 2024, were published by Bridge House, and are on Amazon. Witches, Quakers and Nonconformists, 2022, is sold at the Pendle Heritage Centre, Barrowford. 

Did you enjoy the story? Would you like to shout us a coffee? Half of what you pay goes to the writers and half towards supporting the project (web site maintenance, preparing the next Best of book etc.)

Back in the Day by Jenny Palmer, Lassi

‘Let’s do it,’ Jeanette said. ‘It’s ages since we met up. It must be getting on for six years or more. It was before Covid, I know that. We’ve been talking about it for so long. Let’s just go.’

‘Well, we do need to find somewhere to stay first,’ warned Marsha. ‘This is London we’re talking about. Last time I looked, the prices had shot up.’

‘Where there’s a will, there’s a way,’ said Jeanette. ‘I’ll have a look at the accommodation websites and see what I can come up with. Tell me your dates so we can coordinate.’

Before Covid, Marsha and Jeanette had often met up in London where they had once been work colleagues. On retirement they had moved out to different parts of the country. London was the best place for a rendezvous. It had art galleries, cinemas, theatres, the lot. When you lived in London, you took all that for granted, she reflected.

It was a bit of a scrabble finding anywhere to stay. Jeanette looked at the sites they’d previously used. Eventually she came across a hostel near Warren Street tube that still had four rooms available.

‘That’s perfect,’ said Marsha. ‘I used to get off the tube there when we worked together. It’ll be a trip down memory lane. We’ll be able to walk everywhere from there or get buses.’

It was exhilarating making a decision and acting on it. Jeanette was pleased they’d managed to coordinate their dates and booked their stay in such a short space of time. Going to a place you already knew took the stress out of travel. You didn’t have to worry about getting from A to B. You already knew all the places to go.

Marsha would spend some time visiting her relatives and Jeanette would be meeting up with friends. They would meet up in the evening to go out to eat.

‘We can go to one of those Bel Pourri places in Drummond Street,’ said Jeanette.

 ‘Or the Turkish restaurant near the British museum where we used to go after work.’

‘And there’s the Open-Air Theatre in Regent’s Park. I don’t think you have to book for that.’

 Mostly though Jeanette loved just wandering around the streets, reminiscing about people she’d known and places she’d worked back in the day: the picnics on Hampstead Heath, the music festivals at the South Bank. Not to forget the marches and demos. That was all part and parcel of the place, part of her history.

Since she last went on a train, they’d closed the local ticket office. It had been so much simpler then. She used to pop in there on the day before travelling and book a Standard Saver Open Return. The man in the office would take it upon himself to write down all the times and changes and even platforms. It took all the stress out of travelling. Now she would have to organize all that herself. True there was a ticket machine at that station, but it was tiresome working out how to use it when there was a queue of people behind you.

‘I can’t be bothered with all the faff,’ said Marsha. ‘I think I will drive into town and get the people at the train station to do it for me. It’s only thirteen miles away.’

Jeanette wasn’t giving in to technology. She managed most things on her smart phone. She did online banking, booked concert tickets, and ordered goods. How hard could it be?

First, she would have to renew her Senior Rail card. That should be straightforward enough. But the Trainline App was still using her old email. After considerable time trying to update her personal information, she eventually sent them an email and received a reply saying they would deal with it within the next ten days. Frustrated, she rang Customer Support and got them to change it for her. When she finally got back into the app again, there was another stumbling block. This time they wanted her to upload a passport-sized photo of herself. It had to be in jpeg and in the correct, specified size.

Google was not in the least bit helpful in explaining how that should be done. Taking a selfie and finding it in Gallery was the easy bit. But did you then have to crop the photo, to get it to the right size or what? Another lengthy conversation ensued with yet another Customer Support woman, who condescendingly kept asking if she didn’t have somebody nearer who could help, making her feel like some sort of nitwit who couldn’t manage technology. After much trial and error, she eventually realized that the app uploaded the photo automatically, without you having to do anything.

All she needed to do now was book the ticket. Having filled in her personal information any number of times already, she specified the dates and times and paid up.

‘Success,’ the next email read. ‘You are on your way to London.’

 But the tickets had disappeared somewhere into the Trainline App, along with the Rail Card. She only hoped she’d be able to locate them when asked to produce them on the train. She’d been caught out like that once before. To be on the safe side, she’d print out the tickets so that she could easily produce them when the guard came round. But then the ink ran out on her printer, and she had to order some new cartridges from Amazon. They wouldn’t be delivered until the next day.

‘It took me three hours to get it all sorted,’ she told Marsha next time they spoke. ‘I thought technology was supposed to make things easier. I’m afraid I may have over-identified with the Luddites back in the nineteenth century. The difference being that they were smashing up machines because their livelihoods were at stake. For me, it was a question of my sanity.’  

About the author 

 

Jenny Palmer writes short stories, poetry, memoir and family history. Her collections 'Keepsake and Other Stories.' 2018, and 'Butterflies and Other Stories,' 2024, were published by Bridge House, and are on Amazon. 'Witches, Quakers and Nonconformists,' 2022, is sold at the Pendle Heritage Centre, Barrowford. 

Did you enjoy the story? Would you like to shout us a coffee? Half of what you pay goes to the writers and half towards supporting the project (web site maintenance, preparing the next Best of book etc.)

Common Ground by Jenny Palmer, Bloody Mary

‘I’m interested in end-of-times civilization,’ the man said. I’d seen him hovering around before he finally decided to come over to my table. He was getting on in years and had an amicable face. He had visited every other author in the room. I was at a book event trying to sell my latest offering. It was one of those ‘Meet the public’ events, where you sit at a table all day long, trying to interest people in your thoughts, the ones you’ve written down on paper at least, hoping that someone will fork out and buy a book.

‘Can you tell me what you mean by end-of-times civilisation?’ I asked him. I’m of the opinion that it’s better to engage with the public, rather than go in for the hard sell, which only tends to put them off. And I was genuinely interested. I had been reading about the concept of end-of-times fascism, a phrase coined by an American political analyst to describe the current state of US politics. I didn’t know which side of the political divide this man was on but maybe we could find some common ground.

‘The world is in turmoil,’ he said. ‘Just look around you. There are wars everywhere. Countries are in upheaval. We’re heading for the end of civilization. Humanity is going to the dogs and there’s nothing we can do to stop it. It’s all been written down. You need look no farther than Ecclesiastes.’

When people start quoting the Bible at me, the warning bells go off. I once got caught out by a Mormon who tried to convert me at one of these events and it had taken ages to shake him off. I attract people of a theological bent. They must think I’m fair game or something. It has to do with the books I’m selling about my Quaker ancestors. I should have known better than to bring them along this time and stuck to the short stories instead. I didn’t want to engage with him on a theological level. He would have a superior knowledge of the Bible to me.

‘I agree with you about the state of the world,’ I said tentatively. ‘It is all heading in the wrong direction now that the oligarchs are in control. They don’t care about the likes of you and me. They are doing nothing to try and stop the fighting. They are ignoring climate change and are intent on furthering their own ends, while claiming to be on the side of the people. If things carry on like this, it will only get worse.’ I avoided using the word Armageddon. It would only encourage him.

‘It’s up to us to stand up and be counted,’ I continued. ‘The Quakers back in the seventeenth century weren’t fatalistic,’ I said, referring to the personalities I’d researched for my family history book. ‘Their lives were in turmoil too. They were persecuted during the Civil War and after the Restoration of the Monarchy. They were excommunicated by the church and sent to jail by the state for their faith. But they didn’t give up. Once their religion was tolerated, they went on to become successful citizens and were at the forefront of peace processes in the world. They are still doing it today.’

 I admit I was trying to steer him on to talking about my books. After all that was what I was there for. But he showed no interest in them or what I was saying.

‘These things are cyclical,’ he told me. ‘It’s all been predicted in Ecclesiastes. They will recur again and again, until they don’t.’ 

I had a knowledge of the New Testament but had never read the Old. But the message he was propounding was coming over loud and clear. The fate of the world had been written down long ago. And now the end was nigh.

‘It’s up to us all to do something about it,’ I said. ‘There have been huge developments in technology of late. We have the tools to solve the climate crisis if we would only put our minds to it. There is a lack of political will. That is the stumbling block.’

‘I’m really enjoying this conversation,’ he said. ‘I’d love to continue it, but I haven’t got time right now.’

Everyone was packing up and I could see he had no intention of buying any books from me. He had not been in the least receptive to my ideas. His ideas were fixed. There was nothing original about them. They were determined by a text which had been written by another human being, thousands of years before. A gap had opened between us. There was no common ground. 

About the author 

Jenny Palmer writes short stories, poetry, memoir and family history. Her collections 'Keepsake and Other Stories.' 2018, and 'Butterflies and Other Stories,' 2024, were published by Bridge House, and are on Amazon. 'Witches, Quakers and Nonconformists,' 2022, is sold at the Pendle Heritage Centre, Barrowford. 

Did you enjoy the story? Would you like to shout us a coffee? Half of what you pay goes to the writers and half towards supporting the project (web site maintenance, preparing the next Best of book etc.)

A Better You by Jenny Palmer, a non-alcoholic Guinness

Judith had embarked on a process of consciousness raising. She’d been watching a video by one of her favourite YouTube gurus.

‘The world is going to hell in a handcart,’ he’d said. ‘But all is not lost. It might be difficult to change the power structures, but there is something you can do. You can become a better you.’

According to the guru, there were two basic ways to change the world. One was to work on the external structures and institutions that perpetuated the situation where oligarchs and tyrants were running the show, and the other was to work on yourself. Of the two, the second option seemed immediately more appealing. It required looking inside yourself, finding the things that needed changing and working on them.

The first thing that came to mind was that she could be kinder to friends. She’d got into the habit of late, of not answering the phone. It had all started during Covid when phone calls from friends had become interminable, since they weren’t able to meet up in person. And on top of that, there were lots of hoax calls, and you were forever trying not to be caught out.

‘People will always ring back if it’s urgent,’ Judith would tell people.

Next time the phone rang she would go back to checking caller-display before picking up. Her friend Angela was the first to ring.

‘How are you today?’ Judith asked in the most cheerful voice she could muster. Angela had innumerable health issues and liked to go into them in detail. There would follow a lengthy conversation about Angela’s health.

‘Would you like me to come round and do some shopping?’ Judith burst out with, thinking it would keep the conversation short. ‘I’m going into town today.’

Angela was taken aback at first but not being one to waste an opportunity, she furnished Judith with a lengthy shopping list. By the time she’d dropped off Angela’s shopping, Judith was late home for lunch, and too late for her customary afternoon nap.

Skimping on sleep meant she really needed the twenty-minute nap after lunch. It became an integral part of her daily routine. It revived her enough to be able to cope with the rest of the day. And there were other benefits. A nap settled the mind and kept random thoughts at bay - thoughts like, ‘Would there ever be a peace agreement in the major wars that were raging, or would the whole situation develop into World War III?’

Being a night owl by nature, Judith never went to bed before twelve o’clock. She preferred to stay up and watch the news on TV and the late-night Press preview. Being in the know about what was happening in the world somehow made her feel one step ahead. Once in bed, she’d then watch films on Netflix until she fell asleep.

Without the nap, she was tired and irritable. The only thing to do was to focus on her self-improvement programme. One thing she’d noticed of late was her propensity to criticise the newsreaders on TV.

‘Why on earth is she wearing those flared trousers?’ A voice inside her would say, when one of them had changed from her normal attire. Or ‘why doesn’t she realise that curly hair doesn’t suit her? Her hair is naturally straight.’

 The newsreaders were invariably female. She was horrified to realise that she was doing what men were often accused of doing – judging women by their appearance. It might be a case of blaming the messenger, the bringer of bad news, but still it was hypocritical. She resolved to refrain from her criticism and to listen to what they said in future.

The guru maintained that we could essentially choose who we wanted to be, that it wasn’t all down to fate. Judith was a night owl. What if she were to change the habit of a lifetime and become an early bird?

Early to bed, early to rise, makes a man healthy, wealthy, and wise, was a saying often reiterated by her mother, who was also fond of saying, ‘You’ve missed the best part of the day,’ whenever Judith emerged from her weekend slumbers at nine o’clock in the mornings. Her mother would have been up since six.

Becoming an early bird meant going to bed early and missing the news. Not hearing about all the atrocities that were going on in the world could only be a good thing. Judith looked forward to many restful nights of sleep ahead. But getting up early proved to be more of a challenge than she’d imagined. She had to reset her body clock. It meant reintroducing an alarm clock into her life - something she had happily abandoned in retirement. Going to bed early wasn’t the same thing as going to sleep early. For a week she tossed and turned into the early hours, barely falling asleep before the alarm clock rang.

It wasn’t long before she reverted to type. A night owl was what she’d always been and a night owl she would stay. There were some things you couldn’t change. Working on yourself was a distraction, anyway. She couldn’t put it off any longer. It was time to start working on the second option - changing the structures that allowed megalomaniacs to get into power. But who knew how you did that? 

About the author

Jenny Palmer writes short stories, poetry, memoir and family history. Her collections 'Keepsake and Other Stories.' 2018, and 'Butterflies and Other Stories,' 2024, were published by Bridge House, and are on Amazon. 'Witches, Quakers and Nonconformists,' 2022, is sold at the Pendle Heritage Centre, Barrowford. 

Did you enjoy the story? Would you like to shout us a coffee? Half of what you pay goes to the writers and half towards supporting the project (web site maintenance, preparing the next Best of book etc.)