My dad would have been 81 today but he died a few years shy of seeing another decade. It’s long enough ago for me to reflect peacefully, to cradle his absence from a place of stillness. Not that opening packages of memory comes without emotion, but now any pain I feel has a soft give, … Continue reading Whole
I feel like I’m adjusting from this to that, from something to other, but I have no idea what either is. I simply have a sense that I am somewhere indeterminate, somewhere between before and after. How’s that for a jumbled description of my current juddering internal compass? Let me try harder to explain. It’s as … Continue reading Stew
‘The thing I dread most, far more than the gossip – and God knows, I really don't like gossip – is the pity. The thought of people feeling sorry for me is too much. My worst nightmare is others holding a pity party on the coat tails of my misfortune.’ It had been a long time … Continue reading I Don’t Want Pity
Sometimes your worst fears come true. They can be small fears, like being landed with a parking ticket in the heart of the countryside on a Sunday afternoon when all you’ve done is to park up on a wide verge so as to take a walk across the moors. Or they can be large fears, … Continue reading Sometimes
Blowing things out of all proportion and adopting the out-of-balance perspective – haven’t we all had our fair share of practice at it? I went to get into my car the other day and noticed a ding at the rear right hand side, just above the reverse light. Bodywork dented and scraped, paint gouged and … Continue reading Dust
Wasn’t it awful watching television footage of Notre Dame Cathedral burning furiously earlier this week? That it is a monument so ancient, recognisable, and steadfast made it all the more shocking. It stirred a deep unease in my heart, its partial destruction acting as a powerful reminder about what is precious yet precarious: everything. I was reminded … Continue reading Tumbling Down
A car horn is for two things: 1. To indicate peril, threat to life, impending death. In this instance the horn should be used in a sharp, short burst to alert adjacent vehicle(s) to the possibility of a horrible accident about to unfurl. 2. It’s a rural town in Ireland and the local publican’s daughter … Continue reading Beep Beep
I don't know what age children are when they start asking, ‘But why?’ Are they three-years old? Four? And when does the, ‘But why?’ battery wear out? I going to guess it wears out sometime around sixteen; the age at which the questions evaporate because they (kid-ults) know the answer to everything. From such secure … Continue reading But Why?
Those who live in an Edinburgh tenement, like me, will have experience of the shared responsibility for maintaining ‘the stair’. I think I may have written about it before. It’s the common stairwell that leads - in my tenement - into eleven different flats: two in the basement, and three on each of the first, … Continue reading First World Problems
Sensory overload, information overload, news overload, work overload, people overload. What about, ‘thinking overload’? What about those same old, tired thoughts that, if you are anything like me, are heavy to lift and wearing to carry around? I’m going away from the weekend and I have to pack within a 10-kilo weight limit. Easy for most, but … Continue reading Being Human
