One day

Wildlife on Regent's Canal

My alarm is set for 6.50 but I wake up at 6 when the central heating kicks in. The fiery gas heart pumps hot water through the creaking pipe veins from a cupboard in my room. The house is coming to life and sleep is over with, another tick on the to do list. My brain quickly fades back into consciousness and I am excited for the day ahead. I lie in the warmth of my bed and plan the space between waking and leaving for a swim. As the earliest riser in the house I am very aware of disturbing my flatmates especially as one of the 3 bedrooms is a mezzanine without solid walls and a gentle fart would be enough to disturb its slumbering occupant. I creep across the hall in thick socks, the whine of a door hinge sounding as loud as a church organ across the peace of dawn. Safely into the kitchen and on with the kettle. A noisy beast but what’s to be done? Armed with the requisite paraphernalia to begin my caffeinated campaign on the day I slip back into my room.

This is a beautiful part of the day. It is a time that I feel is truly mine. I have an hour to write as I watch the dawn break across the roofs of Hackney and I bash away at the keyboard, each stroke like the fall of a sledgehammer, drilling into the brains of my unfortunate flatmates. A while later, I am shouldering a heavy bag containing swimming gear, work clothes and lunch as a bear with a sore head stands at the door to the bathroom and I whisper goodbye and have a good day, wheeling my bike out of the flat and into the corridor.

London Fields Lido is still busy despite the season. A mile or more of watery meditation in the steaming lanes is the way to start the day. Avoiding a face full of arse or size 12 foot from the obnoxious tumble turners I plough on in sensory deprivation until emerging, as if from the primordial soup, slightly more developed. The water is heated to a pleasant 26C so it’s only getting out and bare feet on early morning concrete that present any unpleasantness, soon alleviated by a blasting hot shower. Outside the swimming pool I look out across the carpet of leaves on London Fields. Dogs scamper this way and that and the sight soothes my eyes. I’ll keep the memory alive as I plunge back into the concrete Jenga.

The day is busy. My brain burns hundreds of calories processing information, thinking, planning and communicating. From my desk I look out at the 30-storey Citypoint building, home to thrusting businesses and an expensive gym. I have been to the top and the view is fabulous. From the 2^nd floor of my building you have to use your imagination. At lunchtime I take a quick bite in the windowless canteen before stepping out for some air and with my coat zipped against the elements I march towards the Barbican High Walk, a bewildering maze of interconnected concrete walkways, which allows the residents of the brutally beautiful Barbican Estate to move around free from the traffic below. From the Barbican Centre for some jazz on a Saturday to the residents only garden, and back to your apartment without stepping foot on the pavement. How delightful. The street is accessed at numerous points by discrete staircases that you wouldn’t notice unless you were looking for them. In summer, and in winter too for the hardy, the outside space and water features adjacent to the Barbican Centre are a lunchtime playground for office workers in the know. Nearby, a preserved section of the original Roman wall around London stands testament to the long history of this city. The old fortification stands out starkly against the steel and glass towers all around. In the information age firewalls are more relevant than stone ones but I doubt very much if City Place House or City Tower will still be standing in 2,000 years.

My energy seems relentless but my eyes tell the true story. There are lines and shadows were a well-rested person has none. Take me out of London and put me on a wild beach or in the bosom of an untamed forest, or high on a snowy mountain, and then I can pause. Here in the city the swirling energy of millions of striving souls seeps into me and I feel connected. It is possible to be exhausted to the point of physical collapse but it seems a buzzing brain can drive its vehicle on across an extended period of sleep deprivation. And so I keep going. Where is the off switch?

The gasholder by Broadway Market

Home from work and quickly away for running respite down by the canal. Pavement pounding, pushing past pain. Who can predict how a person will react to grief? I am thankful that despite the deep sadness I have been able to respond positively to the challenge but I cannot imagine how I would have coped without exercise. I cast a silent prayer to the evening sky giving thanks to my Mum to whom I owe everything. She smiles down, telling me to slow down. I shrug – “Sorry mum, I’ve got shit to do”.

Once I am back in the warmth and showered the evening disappears in a parade of cooking, washing, planning holidays and hanging artwork on my wall. It seems I am challenging myself to fit as much as possible into each 24 hours but by half past eleven my bed is calling me. I feel I have given the day a good run for its money and have earned my repose. Tom Wolfe entertains me for half an hour or so with his tales of gross extravagance and hideous inequality in 1980s New York before I turn out the light at midnight.

Sleep comes quickly and most often dreamlessly. Perhaps that is not accurate because they say a person always dreams but may not recall their unconscious adventure when they wake. I rarely rise from my rest with a tale to tell, it’s like somebody ripped the plug out, system shutdown. Thank god. And then when my eyes pop open I know the day has begun. My mind is jolted back into action by jump leads running from a great engine and clamped directly into my grey matter. My brain whirs up like the death dispensing chain gun attached to an Apache helicopter and thoughts fly hither and thither like nuggets of lead ripping through the shroud of sleep.

I lie in the warmth of my bed and plan the space between waking and leaving for a swim. I am excited for the day ahead and what can be achieved. I wait for the boiler to burst into life and reassure me that, although it is still nearly an hour before my pointless alarm is due to go off at 6.50 am, it is okay to get out of bed and start the day. I lie and wait and think and plan. I wait and plan and think and become impatient. Perhaps the boiler is broken, it has been playing up recently. I wait some more before resigning myself to checking the time on my phone, which lies charging on the floor. It’s 1 am. 

And so it begins....

I would not have thought so