close to home
We had snow last week, so my memories turned to summer, even though I know about the importance of living in the moment: my days are numbered, let’s enjoy all the ones that are left (no, I don’t have a terminal disease, but I’m not expecting to live for ever). I’ve already mentioned I’m not… Read More
Some mornings are so exquisite that words fail me. Today there was a unexpected moment, despite two pet rabbits nibbling on my frosted grass – accidental lawnmowers, I’m happy to share my grass but please don’t prune the camellias. My favourite poet, who always has words for the times that I don’t, wrote about a… Read More
Surviving. Smiling. I wonder if anyone else has ever built a house with gritted teeth and a tight smile, as I did. I liked the old place you see, the one that’s no longer there. I had run from my house in middle-of-the-day darkness, with flames sprouting from the bushes, leaping to take possession of… Read More
… Leonard Woolf, a middle-aged man of letters, donned two pairs of socks and pruned apples in Sussex’s frozen January. The garden was his personal struggle with a conflicted but beloved cosmos. It would not last, and neither would he. But it was worth holding onto, for precisely the reason books were worth reading… Read More