Photograph your fears

That saying: 'Face you fears'...

Nuh-uh.

This is what you do:
1. Notice your fear cunningly disguised as a leaf RIGHT UNDER YOUR NOSE JUST WHERE YOU WERE GARDENING!
2. Squeak in a surprisingly youthful way for a 42-year-old mother of three.
3. Pant and 'Oooh!' a little.
4. Run and fetch camera because you're running anyway!
5. Stand 6 feet away from the fear and zoom in on it, talking constantly. (Fears can't surprise you if you talk)
6. Jiggle from foot to foot in flight instinct between shots just in case your fear decides to... to... to... you know, the things that fearful things do: frighten you, or whatever.
7. Realise that fearful thing can't be photographed because there is too much long grass in the way.
8. Fetch small, handheld grass shears and snip away grass in short jumpy phases - never taking your eye off the fearful thing.
9. Take more photos whilst being secretly impressed that the (lets face it not very big) fearful thing wasn't afraid of shears or massive human.
10. Call over the 7-year-old to admire beautiful wonder of nature without squeaking, flapping or running away. Talk about how it looks like the silver birch leaves under the tree.
11. Get inside before dark and lock all doors and windows.
12. Look up moths on Internet and find poplar hawk moth.
13. Hope very much that no moths are in the house.

The crazy thing is I climbed up a sloping bank to cut the hedge with shears and thrust my bare arms into stinging nettles. I could have fallen at any time, cut myself at any time and I did sting my arms which are still throbbing now. No moth has ever hurt me. (obviously).

When they're outside they're pretty cool.

In other news: The flash-fiction anthology I organised, edited and published on behalf of all us Flash Fiction South West writers is now available on Amazon: Kissing Frankenstein & Other Stories

(whoopee!)

I would skip but I have a headache