child

I was visiting the home of a woman and her child. It was late afternoon and I felt in limbo, not sure of what to do. Earlier, there had been more people gathered, but now, the visitors had all left. The woman’s sister had gone to be with her partner and child – they had a feeling of ‘home’ with one another. I asked the woman, who looked to be in her mid-fifties, if she was happy that she had had a child and she told me that she was too old and too tired. Though she loved him, she wished she hadn’t. It was time to rest. I lay on a bed near the window with B. We looked out and could see a woman walking along the street. As she came nearer, she became younger and divided into two young girls of about fourteen or so. Both had long frizzy hair and were part indigenous. They came up to the window and began talking to us. They looked at my fingernails and commented upon the wide moons at the base of my nails (that looked much bigger and more definite than in real-life), saying they were genetic and mutant. (?) One of the girls asked if she could cut my fingernails and although I am particular about how they are cut, I let her. She cut the nails of my right hand rather haphazardly and I knew I would redo them later, but it was important to me that we formed a bond. When she had finished, she became younger and younger until she was just a baby. I rolled her onto her back and tickled her tummy, before rocking her to sleep. I put her up on a high shelf, toward the back and nestled between some soft toys, so that she wouldn’t fall out. I went and checked on the rest of the house. There were children sleeping in a couple of the rooms. I went back to where I had placed the baby, trying to work out if the shelf was the safest place for her to sleep.