There is a whole lot of baloney talked about how failure is the new success, and, as far as I can make out, the only people who spout it are those who succeed in the end: the ‘it makes me stronger, wiser, more determined’ brigade. The learning that comes from failure is lauded as something … Continue reading Keeping The Dream Alive
Kate, my niece, is making a Recency-style Spencer jacket; she downloaded the pattern from the internet. ‘It’s spare on instructions,’ she tells me. ‘It says things like – then attach the arm, and not a word more.’ She is a surgeon with fabric, and can, somehow, execute this reverse amputation with minimum trial and error and … Continue reading Unpick and Start Again
Gabriel Byrne, the Irish actor, had a book out last year, I heard him talk about it on a radio interview. I didn’t know it was him at first, I just thought, ‘there’s a man with a lovely accent who knows how to tell a story’, and so I kept listening, mostly because of that … Continue reading The Best We Can Do Is Move On
Small consolations. That’s what the last year has been full of. We are told to observe them, to remember that life is made up of them, a series of tiny moments, most of which we dismiss as inconsequential. Yet the more we take notice of the small consolations, the more apparent it is that they … Continue reading A Year of Consolation
We start to lose the light this time of year and the sun moves back towards the bridges. Every evening as I watch it set from Calton Hill the sun creeps closer to the whale bone rib cage cable stays of the Queensferry Crossing. The runner beans in the backgreen have stopped searching for whatever … Continue reading This Time of Year
We imagine that the things we have make us. All sorts of trivial stuff. Or at least I did, when I was younger. I thought I would only become a responsible, functioning adult when I had a house filled with everything I needed and more besides. And I spent years accumulating; accumulating things I thought … Continue reading All Sorts of Trivial Stuff
New Year’s Resolution: adopt more causes. The problem is, there is a proliferation of them. A cursory search for something worthwhile threw up too many, causing me to furrow my brow, so I’ve decided to plough my own furrow and create my own list of (perhaps light-hearted) causes. Cause Number One: Campaign to save spurned … Continue reading Rebel With a Cause
Dear 2019, It’s not me, it’s you. Yet, despite you being the one leaving me, I’m not going to take it badly. I refuse for us to part on bad terms. At this stage in the game, I’ve got used to how you operate: you’re all full-on at the start of the year, promising me … Continue reading Breaking Up is Hard to Do
‘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
“Basically you’ve run away.” The words slipped out, loosened by the Burns Night whisky; I called it Talisker-tongue. I immediately feared that branding her a runaway may not have been the most sensitive thing to say, but S. didn’t seem to mind. On the contrary, she giggled delightedly. “Yes, I suppose you could say that, … Continue reading Runaway
My Edinburgh Press 