PRESENT DAY SNIPPET: WE MADE IT!
Gaddings Dam, walks in the hills, my husband’s new photography skills, the Yorkshire Dales, Bettys Tearoom, and our ‘staycation’
I have never done a ‘staycation’ before but, despite Michael and I earning more than ever before, inflation and the cost of living crisis hits us all. I swear every single bill has gone up and anyone in the UK surely knows about the increase of the dreaded food and energy bills.
Despite being a household of two and not eating lobster and caviar every night (I mean Michael would hate both those things), when we were combing through our finances to plan the remainder of the year, we realised that we as a ‘family of two’ (plus the cat) spent £800-1,200/month on food shopping, which is ridiculous and now we have really started to reign in what we spend.
All of this is to say that we couldn’t afford even two holidays abroad this year whereas in the past we were lucky to go on two to three and stay in nice hotels (boo hoo, I know).
This year, we decided that we were using our two weeks off as a ‘staycation’ of sorts and just roaming the hills and not spending as much money and it was lovely to have slower days.
I also find that when my schedule is not packed to the rafters, I don’t accomplish as much so perhaps my pipe dream of ever just spending all day being a ‘writer’ may not pan out as well as I’d hoped. If I ever didn’t have the figurative 9-5 I imagine I’d spend the first third of my morning listening to audiobooks and playing games on my phone after scrolling mindlessly on Instagram videos and then I’d eventually emerge in my nightie to brush my teeth (I can’t do anything without having brushed teeth) and then have a cup of tea and maybe some breakfast but at this point it would be brunch and then only if Michael dragged me for a walk would I go out. This would undo my usual morning routine which is writing at least an hour before my day job, walking on my treadmill desk all day at a low speed, and a couple of days per week fitting in a quick workout at the end of the day or during my lunch break.
I may overspend with things like a nutritionist and therapy, too, which I consider vital. And my Substack subscription bill is definitely something I can cut back on eventually. I love supporting writers but I fully understand that it can get expensive and when you’re looking at ways to cut back, things like ‘paid posts’ are sometimes the first to go.
With that said, if you like Why We Met and can’t afford a subscription but want to be a paid subscriber, I’ll always gift free subscriptions no questions asked if you email me. I really get it. I’d love to support all of the writers I read on Substack, but it’s just not feasible. And even if the subscription fees seem small (like £4-7/month) subscribe to 5-10 writers and you’ve now spent part of your grocery bill.
Michael and I have even cut out the extra Amazon Prime membership that we had each been paying for for years and gone to a ‘family plan’ so that Bezos doesn’t get our extra £100/year.
Does anyone else NOT live an influencer-style life?
I was thinking after seeing one of the celeb Substackers do a fashion roundup of things to buy for the Autumn and realising that one jumper that was very lovely was about £400, that I am thankful for the life I have but I definitely live a ‘non-influencer’ kind of life.
Every bit of my home is not Instagram-worthy. I try and keep things decluttered and tidy. But I shop at places like Next, M&S, and John Lewis and not Chanel, Hermes, and Prada – or even Free People or All Saints or wherever fancier people shop for their cashmere jumpers and seasonal boots.
I replaced my old walking coat with a new one (DKNY from TK Maxx if it really is ‘the brand’ for £80) and I just don’t have a massive inventory of things. I have plenty of clothes, don’t get me wrong, far too many, but not as many as these influencer-y people seem to have.
I have a Barbour coat that is my winter coat and I’ve had that for three or four years now and it’s in good condition and I still love it. It was the most expensive coat I’d ever bought but figured if I used it for five to ten years, it’s fine.
Then, I had a walking coat which somehow got misplaced and my ‘nice belted wool coat’ that my first husband bought me at Barneys New York. It’s still a good coat so I still wear it even though it’s at least eleven years old. And that’s pretty much it besides a couple of faux leather jackets (both inexpensive and one from Facebook marketplace) and blazers.
I have been sucked into buying Fabletics and the odd Popflex item – both companies I rate – but not been drawn into LuluLemon or Sweaty Betty because even though the latter two are ‘a bit expensive’ the former are ‘ridiculously expensive.’
I’ve gone in for the odd trendy item like Teva sandals (love them) and Veja trainers (ish about these because mine sounded like squeaky farts (until I added talcum powder) when I walked but I liked they were nice quality and leather but when I buy an item, I wear it and don’t buy multiples of them. I’m tempted to buy more Teva sandals but I’d have to part with other items in my closet that I don’t wear as often because our storage is limited.
I used to buy a Tory Birch or Kate Spade handbag each year and use it to death for a year. I haven’t done that in years now since the prices kept going up. I used to be able to find a nice leather handbag by these brands for around £200 on sale but now the prices are crazy. My cousin, Pam, has a couple of lovely Mulberry bags and I have my eye on one or two for some unknown future, but any ‘luxury’ handbags or items I own are leftovers from my first marriage.
Michael and I are working on our goal of paying off the mortgage in three years at which point I’ll be forty and he will be fifty. We are incredibly lucky that Michael bought his house from his parents when they divorced at a price that's lower than house prices today. We wouldn’t be in the privileged position we are without that. But even still, clearly, we are not in the celeb Substacker tax bracket!
Gaddings Dam
If you caught my last present-day snippet here about the eleven-mile walk with my husband that didn’t feel so lovely in the pissing down rain, then you’ll know on that walk we were trying to get to Gaddings Dam in Todmorden, West Yorkshire (where we live) but my husband hadn’t realised that the place he thought was Gaddings wasn’t.
PRESENT-DAY SNIPPET: ONE YEAR IN, THE THINGS I SUBMITTED, READING, BANK HOLIDAYS, AND TAKING THE RING TO MORDOR*
My husband, Michael, is 46 today. It’s the ninth birthday we have spent together as I was there when he turned from 37 (my age now) to 38, which is quite exciting. On his birthday – and this is the kind of lovely man I married second go around – he’s just brought me dippy eggs and toast soldiers in bed whilst I finish off this post that I’d intended to send out yesterday and now have to adapt because I’m sending it out today.
So, we finally found the right way to get to Gaddings Dam thanks to Michael’s sister’s (Claire) directions. We stopped off afterwards for a pint of delicious blackberry cider at the Shepherd’s Rest (and I had a sneaky portion of chips – I can’t resist good quality pub chips) after our walk. Despite not being very big – and I can imagine it being difficult to find parking during peak times – it was lovely and peaceful up there.
There was one other couple on the ‘beach’ with their dog. We walked the steep way down which isn’t maybe recommended for people with mobility issues. I’d say the walk has a medium difficulty level overall. There are some bits that are on a slight cliff edge with some rocky stones going up but once you’re on the tops, it’s pretty smooth sailing on grassy verges.
Malham Cove, Gordale Scar, and Janet’s Foss
Until our lease vehicle arrives (hence why we have been rejigging finances), we both had cars that we paid for in cash and were, let’s just say, less than reliable at times, despite breakdown cover (mine with RAC, which is getting increasingly more costly).
We have decided that it’s a false economy running ‘cheaper’ cars. In fact, more recently, I had to pay out a whopping £100 for a new tyre when I drove over to get my eyebrows done because mine inexplicably flattened. So, on our ‘staycation’ Michael searched for places to go within a fifty-mile radius and alighted on Malham.
I’ve never been to Malham but when Michael rang his Mum to say where we were she had some anecdote about him paddling in the stream in his undies (or was it a nappy?). And my Mother said she used to go to some church camp near there when she was growing up (she lives in Florida now).
The village was so quaint and it was an absolutely stunning day, which is rare for England. The weather was 66°F (19°C) and it felt quite hot. (It’s funny how I recall when the 60s would feel cold to me and the 70s, nice and crisp when I lived in Florida/Georgia). Sadly, it’ll probably be the last nice week we have until March next year, which I never like to think about – the long winters and the nights closing in.
The light has been beautiful at dusk, though. That’s always Michael’s favourite time of day and the time of day he usually stands in the garden and shouts for me to come and look at the skyline with him (which I do even though by this point I’m usually lying on the sofa and don’t feel like moving).
We found that for a random mid-September Tuesday that it was really busy. I cannot imagine what it would be like on a weekend or a school holiday. We saw a school group on top of the rocks measuring things and recording data – and lots of retirees.
The walk was quite slippery in places where the limestone deposits had been polished like brass and/or tumbled rocks so Michael held my hand to steady me in places but it was beautiful.
Here’s the walk for those interested and/or those Stateside who might not get to go:
I love our little corner of Yorkshire but the views in Malham on the tops was just countryside as far as the eye could see and that’s so peaceful. Michael likes to be a bit go, go, go but I’d have loved to have some more slow moments of sitting for ten minutes or so staring at the views and we did have a bit of that but I could have done with more.
We stopped at the snack van to buy a cider lolly to reminisce on our childhoods; however, they seem to have changed the flavour and they are now distinctly overly sweet apple instead of whatever they were in the 90s, so we won’t be revisiting that memory again.
We climbed up the side of a hill near Gordale Scar and had a picnic. It was like the old days (the first year or two when we were together) when we had no money and would pack a backpack of ‘Tesco picnic items’ like meal deal sandwiches, fruit, chocolate, drinks, whatever, and Michael would pick a beauty spot like Ingleton Falls and we’d hike and have a picnic and lie next to each other looking at the sky, chatting. This time we just had sandwiches, crisps (potato chips), a bit of chocolate, and drinks, but it was lovely to eat our sandwiches with beautiful views on a picnic blanket that was a wedding present from my stepfather (my Mum’s amazing husband) and also lie beside each other, chatting.
Bettys Tearoom, Ilkley and Cliffe Castle
We came here and had an £80 afternoon tea. I’ve had Bettys (am I the only one who so desperately wants to put an apostrophe here?) on a few occasions, but most memorably with Grammy and Pam (my cousin) in Harrogate once when Pam was pregnant with Baby Harry (who is now 8). I think I rate the Midland in Manchester better or the Dome in Edinburgh (and less expensive). Don’t get me wrong, Bettys is an institution and I think if you’re just getting a cream team or a meal then it’s fine but the food looked so small and when food portions look tiny it makes me hungry just imagining it. It was, incidentally, enough food but it didn’t visually feel like it. Does anyone else feel that way?
In Ilkley, we also went to a bookshop together and it was so cute that we both bought books. Sadly, not cool, independent unknown authors who will be the geniuses of tomorrow but the latest Richard Osman book (which came with a free copy of Liz Nugent’s Unravelling Oliver – Oliver, so far, can give some of my exes and past lovers a run for their money in arseholery) and Michael got the new Lee Child short story collection.
Michael has read more this year than in previous years (love this), which I think coincided with him getting reading glasses (but don’t tell anyone). He’s also a huge supporter of my work including reading drafts of novels in progress, competition submissions, and many of my Substack posts (although I think he gave up twenty chapters ago when his obsession with reading about US politics and various wars took over).
We also had a jaunt over to Cliffe Castle Museum in Keighley which I look forward to going to again and spending longer this time. It’s free, too.
#100daysofwriting
We are on day twenty-six of the writing challenge and so far I’ve been so happy to write every day. (A quarter of the way through.)
It was actually more difficult whilst I was on holiday and had ‘more time’ because when Michael is at work (of course), I have more hours alone to carve out for writing. Don’t get me wrong, I adore spending time with Michael and love having the time with him when he’s home but that has meant I’ve only had under an hour to write each day and sometimes only half an hour.
However, even when I got back into my day job the week before last, I still didn’t carve out as much time, but I’m embracing being gentle to myself. Plus, my psychic said I needed to have more fun and stop being so ‘work, work, work.’ I need to have time with Michael, with friends, and with family. I even had one day last week where I didn’t write; my niece and her friend came over and I spent time chatting through the ideas I had for a young adult novel and the girls were a good sounding board.
I’m trying to realise that I don’t have deadlines (after all, there’s no book deal in the wings) and it takes time to finish novels (and I’m only at the beginning of four various projects and one novel that I need to expand and re-edit). Plus, once the novels are written and edited and ‘ready,’ I may need to hire a development editor and work some more and then I have the whole querying process, but it’s best only to think of one step at a time.
Prioritising my husband and giving him time
I’ve had time away from Michael lately and wanted to devote time to him. Last year, I spent a month in Florida during November/December. This year, in July I went to the Arvon writing retreat on a week when Michael and I were both off from work, meaning Michael sacrificed our joint holiday time to let me do something I wanted to do. (Where I met the amazing
and so many beautiful, talented writers, including our other tutor Andrew Michael Hurley. Here’s Katherine’s reel from the week back in July. I can’t wait to see what we all accomplish as a group.)
This September holiday, I’ve had days doing bits of writing here and there and planning things with others. Thus, I wanted to give him my time as he’s so good at letting me get on with what I want to do. He planned little day trips like he did in the ‘old days’ where we spent time walking, snuggling in bed on a Sunday watching television shows, and lying next to each other, chatting for hours. I love that this relationship has always been characterised by communication.
Communicating and clarifying communication to ensure comprehension on both sides really is the secret to happy relationships. There’s an element of compatibility too and choosing each other. I’ve never been in a relationship over eight years and I love that I have my person and that I love being around Michael. There’s so much depth to longer relationships that I’d never had the chance to discover before. We aren’t the same people we were eight years ago but we have evolved together. Michael supports me in my goals and dreams and vice versa.
And there’s still the odd thing I learn about Michael as time goes on – often some quirky habit Michael has and usually makes me laugh and roll my eyes. I’d love to share an example but I really can’t embarrass him! It’s another thing I love about my husband is that he’s always been very much himself, not moulded by societal expectations. He’s unique and interesting. He still keeps me guessing, he still makes me laugh, and he still surprises me. And sometimes I feel I still ought to pinch myself because of my good fortune.
high tea, cats, nice walks, mirror selfies... who cares if your house or your wardrobe isn't influencer-worthy? :) you have great stories to tell
Love this update. Glad you had such a wonderful staycation. I love Ilkley - I went to Uni in Leeds so visited often. Have you been to Haworth? Whether you are a Bronte fan or not it's always lovely there too. (Side note: I am still reeling from the casting choice of Margot Robbie in the new Wuthering Heights - as much as I love her, I just can't see it).