A Reason to Feel Uncomfortable.

I often emphasised during the early years of writing this blog how much I wanted to stay in this locality. It’s set in the southern foothills of the Pennine massif as they gradually give way to the flat land of the Trent valley to the south. It’s a patchwork vista of trees, copses, bigger woods, hedgerows, pasture land, plough land, hay meadows, low hills, and a river valley. As such, it’s not so rugged as to make life tough, and not so flat as to make it tedious. It’s as near perfect as you could wish and a delight to the senses. The problem with living here is not the location, but the house I live in.

It’s not particularly old by European standards – a little over 100 years and therefore Edwardian – but it has a lot of shortcomings which make it uncomfortable at times, especially during high winds, heavy rain, and in the winter. Such difficulties I’ve largely learned to live with and accept for the benefit bestowed by the wider environment, but I’ve often been led to wonder whether there’s a more speculative issue in play.

In common with the style of the Edwardian period, there’s no hallway at the bottom of the stairs. Instead, the stairs are accessed from the living room, and there’s a door at the bottom of them which can be closed in the winter to stop the heat from an open fire escaping upstairs. What I found odd when I first moved here was that the door to the stairs had a bolt fitted on the living room side, the purpose of which could only be to stop somebody upstairs from coming downstairs. That has something of a mad-woman-in-the-attic feel about it, I would say, and I was led to wonder whether there was something dark in the history of the house.

And there have been occasions when I’ve woken up in the early hours and felt a presence in the bedroom. Sometimes I’ve even fancied I could see a figure, slightly darker than the darkness, standing in the corner of the room. I realise, of course, that this can be put down to a simple mental aberration and I’ve always been able to go back to sleep easily enough.

But what about those times when I’ve woken in the night feeling chilled, even when there seems to be no reason for it? It happened again last night. I awoke feeling chilled, and when I moved my legs the sheets were icy cold. And this was on a mild night in August with the temperature perfectly normal for the time of year. I woke up again later and the bed was warm again.

More latterly I’ve been more concerned about my waking state. I feel utterly exhausted both physically and mentally nearly every morning when I wake up. My legs struggle to carry me weakly to the door, and my mental state is all for giving up on this life. It improves to some extent as the day wears on, but it has begun to have me wondering whether some vampiric entity is draining my life force at night. Naturally I’m inclined to dismiss such a speculative suggestion, but times are changing and perceptions of reality are changing with it. The fact that a range of health conditions began shortly after moving here may be put down to the simple matter of ageing.

Put all these factors together, however, and it should come as no surprise that I don’t feel entirely comfortable here. I wonder whether houses and other buildings really do have a genius loci, and whether the one attached to this place doesn’t like me for some reason. Or maybe it’s a previous tenant who’s reluctant to move on and objects to being invaded. Or maybe I’m simply being fanciful and overly imaginative. My nature has always been a little strange, no matter how hard I’ve tried to hide it.

So should I tolerate it or seek to move? Well, moving house requires a lot of time, trouble, and effort, and I would find it more than merely difficult to raise the will and energy to do so. If I had a partner to share the load it would probably be feasible, but since I don’t the answer should be obvious.