The anxiety had been building for days. It manifested, as it so often does in my body, in an eager twitchiness. I was grappling for certainty on untrodden ground and the only way I could get somewhere close to it was by doing little bits of admin I’d been putting off for months. I did a grocery shop for all the food that I know the baby will eat and put a wash on that didn’t entirely need doing. I packed three pairs of shoes in a little case and took four wrong turns on the familiar route to my in-laws to borrow the car. I was going away, and it felt like I was robbing a bank.
© 2025 Alice Vincent
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