
Taken on my morning walk along the River Colne, facing east towards the newly-risen Sun. A reflective time before hosting Zoom lectures.
And did you get what
you wanted from this life, even so?
I did.
And what did you want?
To call myself beloved, to feel myself
beloved on the earth.
Raymond Carver, A New Path to the Waterfall, Atlantic Monthly Press, 1989.
‘It is easier to endure than to change. But once one has changed, what was endured is hard to recall.’
Susan Sontag, The Benefactor (1963)
‘One can never speak enough of the virtues,
the dangers, the power of shared laughter’
Francoise Sagan (1935 – 2004).
Low tide on the River Colne lets the mud tell its stories.
I am too much
For you
You are not enough
For me.
There’s a deep stillness
In me
My own wine
Dark sea
A calm storm
My Odyssey.
Of the 366 in 2020. A leap year.
Looking back, over the views which bridged the reflective new year holiday in Cornwall, before looking forward to what is yet to come.
Returning to Essex, meant returning to work – two different employers, two different jobs, on three different sites in two different towns.
I was met by new faces, old faces, all: ‘Happy 2020!’
I step (rather than leap) into a new job in the third week of this month.
I’m apprehensive and curious; it’s energising. Step forward, 2020.
/ˈmɪrɑːʒ,mɪˈrɑːʒ/
Noun: mirage
1. An optical illusion caused by atmospheric conditions
2. An unrealistic hope or wish that cannot be achieved
Origin – early 19th century: from French se mirer ‘be reflected’, from Latin mirare ‘look at’.
(With thanks to the Oxford English Dictionary).
Lately, although I have felt that much appears unreal and that my life is being lived in suspension as I watch my reflection in a waiting game, I know that this time will pass. It will do so quickly enough, to make way for September with her new beginnings and a change of uniform. And I do believe that this year’s colours are going to suit me.