annanotbob2's Diaryland Diary

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Day 4

While I was at Glasto I wrote in my notebook a few times, which I'm going to copy up here. I realise I have a few new readers, so I will just explain the situation. In 2004, a close friend died and at her funeral I reconnected with her sister, D, who now lives in the town of Glastonbury and told me that the Kids' Field in the festival is run by TC, an old friend of us all, who grew up in the town by the river where we all lived. If you can offer anything to the festival goers children you can have a free pass and protected camping for the duration. Since then I have been to most of them, offering different workshops until finally settling on little fabric-covered notebooks, with sewn-in pages. My kids come too - YD helping get things ready - mainly painting the castle - and Son helping me with the notebooks. We've got to know many of the workers in the kids' field,  [we all camp in the kids' crew field and do gate duty to keep it safe], some of them becoming close friends. It's a real family affair, many groups being multi-generational - lots of grandchildren, including D's.

Here we go, as written:

Glasto 2019, Dayb 4, Weds 26th June

It's International Writing Day or something like that so I'm giving it a go. Sat by my tent in the last of the shade, waiting for my coffee to come through [stove top espresso pot]. I'm tired and lonely and a bit scared of how I'll feel when the music starts. Last time the first chords of the first band on the Pyramid Stage felt like an electric shock and I had to leave at once. [Like leave the site, get a bus then a train, go home kind of leave] But that was a major flood year and SIL was unable to get out of this field unless someone carried him through the mud so he was pissed off, drunk, angry and mean, which didn't help. [YD's husband has MS and bad legs - he needed a mobility scooter on site to cover the distances, but the wheels just whirled round and round in the mud. He kept up the drinking and became an ex-husband] I'd forgotten all that - I knew I was sad and anxious about ED who had moved care homes just a few weeks previously, but I hadn't remembered SIL.

Things I have noted of interest, to me, if no one else:

1. It is annoying when your body clock switches round and you need a shit at six in the morning [this had happened a month or so ago]. This is more so when the toilet is 362 steps from your tent (have pedometer permanently round neck, first steps of day, 724 round trip, ffs) and much much worse when it's raining, which it hadn't been previously so all your waterproofs and wellies need finding and then you're  AWAKE, though I did manage to get back to sleep in the end. YD says to lie still and ask your body what it wants and mine def wanted to sleep, it just took a while. We're on a slope - of course we are, the whole site is either side of a valley - so we roll out of bed and slide down to the end of the tent, getting everything wet on the rainy night, but it all dried out and there's been no more rain so far.


2. Food. We brought frozen home made stuff. I made chicken and veg soup and chorizo lentil and veg stew. YD made dahl. It survived in the cool box - we ate all the meaty stuff first and finished that by the end of the second day then had the dahl yesterday, all good. There's a thing here where they've tried to get the traders to offer a plate of food - a meal - for a fiver and 3/4 of them signed up but I haven't found them yet. Lots of it is v expensive but I brought lots of noodles and shit so we'll see how we get on with it - junk food, but worth a shot.


3. Energy. I'm doing OK but it's challenging. I've walked 5475 steps today already and it's only 3 o'clock and the festival hasn't even started yet, This morning the gates opened, the public came in and I walked down to the very nearest edge of the festival proper to pick up a Guide and on my way back two different people stopped to ask if I was OK, which was nice and kind and all but made me think, fucking hell, I thought I was getting back to normal. YD said I should have told them they should have seen what I was like before.

I do feel lonely. I always do. No one wants to come with me amongst my other friends and this lot are all.. I don't know [wreckheads] I'm on the edge of the crowd always. Part of it is them all doing decor, getting the field ready before the festival opens and being free when it's on and me doing workshops when it's on and free now, before it starts. [Part of it is also about ED and my deep sadness and grief which although not always expressed in terms of words and tears, is part of who I am now and that's huge]. The gates opened this morning but the main stuff starts on Friday, just the kids' field tomorrow after noon

Got to go and meet the MS nurse to discuss funding - back later xx

1:18 p.m. - 04.07.19

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