Kathleen Jowitt writes contemporary literary fiction exploring themes of identity, redemption, integrity, and politics. Her work has been shortlisted for the Exeter Novel Prize and the Selfies Award, and her debut novel, Speak Its Name, was the first ever self-published book to receive a Betty Trask Award.
Week-end: happy new year, Lady Day
Up until a few centuries ago today would have been the first day of the year. I believe in celebrating as many new years as possible, so let’s count it. Actually, there have been a couple of anniversaries lately that I only noticed after the fact: three years since we moved into this house (and the country promptly shut down); a year since I caught Covid. It’s quite encouraging to compare where I am now with where I was then, particularly when I’m feeling frustrated about lack of energy.
The good
I do not have gestational diabetes! (Or, presumably, any other sort.) And I went to the dentist yesterday and my teeth and gums are in pretty good shape. So hurrah for health and for things being less complicated than they might be.
Then there was a long phone call with a friend and a streak of energy that lasted most of the week and got a lot of things sorted out. I’m really enjoying the spring flowers, too.
The mixed
Tony was away this week, cycling across the Netherlands. I missed him rather, though the cat was not bad company, and I got more done than I’d expected, and I am a little bit jealous and considering what the next adventure might be (beyond the obvious one).
The difficult and perplexing
The hob has repaid us for cleaning it by refusing to work (or, rather, tripping the breaker every time we turn the circuit back on). We are hoping it will get over itself.
What’s working
Planning meals (though I think this was particularly successful this week just gone because I was cooking for myself and only myself all the time). Telling myself that if other people are worrying about me, then I don’t need to (this was remarkably helpful).
Reading
I finished Michel the Giant (An African in Greenland), coming away with the sense that life in Greenland is not for me, though he seems to have enjoyed himself there. There’s a real feeling of openness and candour about the way he writes, and his sheer determination to get to where he wants to be is impressive. Nearly finished These Violent Delights.
Writing
Mostly updating policies. And I finally got round to uploading my post about the Belgian Coastal Tramway, only six months or so after the event.
Mending
I darned a couple of pairs of socks, and tidied up the cuff on my navy linen summer coat – which has needed doing for a very long time.
Watching
I have returned to Our Flag Means Death, and have very nearly finished it. But now it’s the world figure skating championships.
Cooking
The Instant Pot has been working hard this week, in its pressure cooker and its slow cooker guises. ‘Mediterranean fennel with nutty crumble’ (the ‘crumble’ is in fact croutons) from The Ultimate Slow Cooker Cookbook: the wrong combination of vegetables, I think – the inclusion of carrots meant it had to cook for a long time, too long for the fennel and particularly for the pepper, which became bitter. Black beans from The Pressure Cooker Cookbook – tasty but more faff than I could really be doing with. Lentil and Swiss chard soup (same) – very good.
Eating
Mostly the above, with rye bread and seeded sourdough. Yesterday I went to my favourite falafel stand for lunch, though.
Noticing
Cowslips! Primroses! More daffodils! Two goldfinches in the plum tree! Another hare!
In the garden
The grape hyacinths are out. On Sunday I sowed cat grass and cosmos and tarragon seeds and some elderly beans; the first two of these are sprouting. I also pulled up the old leggy lavender and wallflowers that were sprawling across the path. Then on Tuesday I pulled up the wallflowers that had self-seeded in the cracks in the path and moved them into the vacated space. We’ll see how they do; there are plenty of other wallflowers if these don’t make it.
I accidentally brought a ladybird in with the laundry; unfortunately it flew away while I was trying to get it out of the window and is probably still in the house somewhere.
Appreciating
Having energy! (And, as today, when I don’t have so much, the fact that I can just nap all afternoon and then go to Evensong.)
Acquisitions
I got a load of bamboo socks off the local free group to see if they’re worth the darning. Initial signs are promising.
Hankering
There is a dress that I very much like the look of on the Joanie site. And I still want a bigger darning loom.
Line of the week
Tété-Michel Kpomassie (translated by James Kirkup) on a Greenland sunset:
The purple disc sank little by little below the line of the horizon; for a few moments longer the brindled sky was still painted with wide and luminous streaks, flaming on the face of the waters, turning to violet on the mountain tops, orange or grey above our heads.
Saturday snippet
A tiny, tiny bit from the Romeo and Juliet thing:
The train slid southwards, the carriage rocking gently, into a future they had set up recklessly and joyously. Neither of them quite knew what it might hold, except for each other.
This coming week
My manager is retiring; there are various things planned to mark the occasion. Also I’m going to the opera. Somewhere in between all this I need to finish the Cursillo annual report, but there really is only a very little left to do.
Anything you’d like to share from this week? Any hopes for next week? Share them here!
De Kusttram: the Belgian coastal tramway
There is one country in the world in which you can travel almost all the way along the coast in a single tram journey. It’s Belgium.
This is made possible by the fact that the Belgian coastline isn’t actually very long. If you were to think of Belgium as a cartoonish stegosaurus with its head facing north-west and its spines interlocking with the Netherlands and Germany and its tail slipping under Luxembourg, only the smooth top of its saurian skull would be up against the sea. You can travel from one end to another in a couple of hours. It doesn’t go quite all the way to the frontier at either end; you could, if you were feeling particularly pedantic, walk the extra bits. We weren’t, so we didn’t.
We were staying in Bruges (Brugge, to the locals): a city built for trade and now operating almost entirely for the benefit of the tourists. The Kusttram is, if anything, the opposite. While its website makes some attempt to sell it as a tourist experience, the material on the ground and, above all, the clientele, make it clear that it’s now used pretty much exclusively by the locals.
We started in Knokke, at the Dutch end of the line, bought day passes from a machine, and got onto a waiting tram just as it started to rain. Result. It swung around a turning circle (the middle planted with sunflowers and cosmos) and I caught a sight of some of the older trams hibernating in a shed. I believe they come out sometimes for heritage days. After a brief glimpse into back gardens, we joined the main road along the coast.
We ran behind the docks at Zeebrugge, seeing various interesting looking cranes and boring lorries. Then we got into sand dunes. For a long way, the dunes were between us and the sea and mostly blocked the view of it; every now and again there were footpaths with signposts pointing to the strand. The exceptions were the towns: a wide open square at one end of Blankenberge; a marina at the other.
Tony was falling asleep as we approached Oostende, so we got off and found a health food café where we bought a distinctly unhealthy coffee (me) and Diet Coke (him). There was also a market of the sort that sells cheap socks and garish T-shirts, clustered around a bandstand decorated with the names of illustrious composers of bygone centuries. We glanced at this briefly, then, finding that there was quite a wait until the next tram, looked into a sportswear shop.
West of Oostende we finally got to see some beach. The road and the tramway ran on the north side of the dunes here, and there were campsites and wartime fortifications to look at too.
After that there were a lot of high-rise seaside flats, mostly between us and the sea. These were a running theme all the way along. I can’t say I thought much of them. They blocked the view when we were on the tram, and when we got off they made textbook urban canyons and sent the sea breeze hurtling along the streets. Towards the end of the line the flats shrank down to detached houses, and then the buildings gave out altogether and we were into trees.
The penultimate stop was Plopsaland, which is a name to conjure with. It’s a theme park. From the tram we could see an artfully crooked house and various roller coastery things. It looked quite fun, as theme parks go. And the car park was full, so it’s obviously popular.
The way back was an opportunity to stop at all the places that had looked interesting on the way through. Also to get some lunch in central De Panne, which hadn’t looked particularly interesting, but which had looked as if it might sell food. It did. We found various options on the seafront and ended up eating omelette and chips in, whenever the door was opened, a stiff breeze. I realised too late for it to be of much use that we were back in French-speaking Belgium. Our waiter was called Guillaume; it said so on the bill.
Then we got back on the tram. Niewpoort had looked interesting. The trams stopped under a big glass roof and there were a couple of restaurants I’d noted as possibilities for lunch. We were no longer in need of something to eat, but we wandered a few blocks inland and found that it was a very pleasant little town, mostly built in the 1920s for, one supposes, the obvious reason. There wasn’t much going on at that time of day, though as we approached the main square the bells were ringing cheerfully. Tony went into Carrefour and came away with a commemorative notebook. I never found out what the occasion was. Meanwhile, I ate an apple and tested myself on the flags of EU nations that were flying alongside the tramway.
We stopped again in Oostende, this time getting off at few stops before the city began in earnest so that we could walk a little way along the beach. A tall ship was darting about a little way offshore. The beach was a generous sweep of pale sand, scattered with seashells. I thought about paddling, but decided against it. The sea was quite a way out, and the wind was cold.
We hopped back on the next tram and then off again closer to the city centre, walking up toward the casino and through the streets, often coinciding with a couple of women trundling enormous suitcases. It was a pleasant wander through Oostende, looking at fantastic twiddly art nouveau buildings, and ending up at the railway station, where we got back on a tram.
Our next stop was De Haan, and it was magnificent. We got off at the main stop – which preserves some beautiful cast-iron signs and a fantastic little hut – and walked seawards. The 1930s had gone to town here. The 1930s had built a town here.Stockbroker’s Tudor, but by the beach. Kingston-upon-Sea. My only regret was that it was getting late and so it didn’t make sense to stop for an ice cream.
I looked with envious eyes upon someone who had brought a pizza box on the tram with them, and the rest of the journey was taken up with thoughts of dinner. Night was falling when we reached the end of the line. It took longer than we’d expected to find somewhere to eat in Knokke, if only because I wasn’t in the mood for giant lumps of meat. We did in fact end up at somewhere that called itself a grill, but they served me a huge dish of seafood pasta, and very nice it was too.
And that, apart from the train back to Bruges, was the end of the day.
Why do this? Well, obviously the main reason to do this is because you can. ‘The only reason’, my neighbour said when I told him where we’d been, but I think that’s a little unfair. There are other coastlines traversable by public transport with far better views (the bus around Land’s End, for example). But why not? It’s a cheap day out, you get a unique snapshot of a nation in a few hours, and it makes a change from the boat trips around the Bruges canals. (To be clear, we also took a boat trip around the Bruges canals.) You could even paddle.
Week-end: fasting
The good
Daffodils. Birds. Loads of writing. The satisfaction of getting shot of some stuff that was cluttering up the place.
The mixed
My short story got rejected. But it was for exactly the reason I expected: it’s way too long and really it wants to be a novel. And the editor really liked it apart from the fact that it was way too long. So. I now find myself with several projects that are well on the way to being something substantial, and I probably need to prioritise.
The difficult and perplexing
Fasting glucose tolerance test. No food from 10pm on Thursday night, train to Cambridge, blood test, glucose drink, hour’s wait, blood test, hour’s wait, blood test. Not my idea of a fun Friday morning, and I felt a bit skew-whiff all the rest of the day. Now we wait to see if I have gestational diabetes. I really hope not.
Train delays at the most inconvenient moment possible. And a decision that was going to result in awkward questions whichever way it went.
What’s working
Early nights. Bathing/showering in the evenings. Saying what I’m not prepared to do.
Reading
Last week I remembered to report my Sunday reading and forgot about the weekdays, in which I finished Death in Cyprus. It was rather an unsatisfactory read: I wanted to slap pretty much everybody; it was incredibly cruel to the older, unattractive character; and the resolution pulled an element out of (so far as I could see) absolutely nowhere. I think Death in Berlin was better.
Still persevering with These Violent Delights.
And I got through most of the latest London Review of Books in between blood tests.
Writing
More on Don’t Quit The Day Job. It’s quite easy writing: at the moment I’m just expounding on my own writing process in an extremely self-indulgent fashion. I’ve only just got all my longhand typed up this evening. What I must do on Monday is rearrange things to fit the new structure.
Thinking about
The myth of the heroic intervention. This came up three times in two days and I think it probably needs a post.
Making
I have the house to myself at the moment and have taken advantage of that fact and got out the sewing machine to do some American-style patchwork. I think my original plan was somewhat overambitious but I’m having fun with the modified pattern.
Mending
Darning a pair of socks, very slowly.
Looking at
An exhibition about the history of Addenbrooke’s after my fasting glucose test.
Cooking
Soup! I adore soup and it is a thousand times less faff in the pressure cooker. I made one with cauliflower and parmesan on Thursday and one with red lentils and Swiss chard this evening.
Eating
The above, plus various things excavated from the freezer. Having got the yoghurt to work last week, I’ve been adding apple sauce, plums, etc. And I made the remains of some roast pork into a sort of stew.
Moving
I managed what used to be my usual walk without having to sit down at least once this week! And I have been getting out for it every morning I’ve been working from home.
Noticing
Robins all over the place, sitting in trees and announcing their presence. Blackbirds, too, and (I think) a bullfinch. And I don’t know whether the decorated cow (whose name, I learned from the information sheet, is Moosha P. Cambridge) has only just arrived outside Sessions House, or if I haven’t been that far along the road, but either way I only noticed her today. Isn’t she magnificent?
In the garden
Got my act together and removed some compost from the Hotbin (the top end was steaming away very happily). Also, not exactly the garden, but I sowed some herb seeds in a pot in the conservatory. Maybe this is the year I get fresh parsley to survive…
Appreciating
Increased energy levels. Soup. Refilling a jar with ground coriander for 32p.
Acquisitions
A bird feeder, the sort made of square mesh to hold peanuts, with a cage around it to keep squirrels out. On getting it home I discovered that we do not in fact have any peanuts. I was sure we did. Never mind. I also got some herb seeds and a nice terracotta pot with multiple holes (see In the garden).
Line of the week
From Theirs and No One Else’s (Nicholas Spice) in the London Review of Books:
There’s a performance of the Prelude to Lohengrin, conducted by Claudio Abbado towards the end of his life, where the orchestra moves like water weed in the current of a river or grassland in a breeze.
Saturday snippet
I wrote and I kept going, wrote and gave up, wrote and wrote and despaired and regained hope and started writing again.
This coming week
I have vague ambitions to Get The House Sorted Out and Get Those Things Drafted and also to Do Some More Patchwork. I also have an appointment to see the midwife and, as mentioned above, should get the results of my glucose test.
Anything you’d like to share from this week? Any hopes for next week? Share them here!
Week-end: riding the wave
The good
A really good writing week! Not only did I write several pages (yet to be typed up) on Don’t Quit The Day Job, I dipped into The Rassendyll Kidnapping, pushed it up above 60,000 words just because it was so close, and decided that maybe it had some possibilities after all. I’m not sure how long I’m going to be able to keep riding this wave, but I’m enjoying it while it lasts.
Yesterday was the Cursillo Quiet Day, which happened very satisfactorily without my having to do very much about it at all. I spent a while sitting on a bench in the churchyard in the sunshine and it was lovely.
The mixed
Tiredness, naps, walks or not, yada yada.
The difficult and perplexing
Winter’s last (one hopes) gasp. I missed Friday’s blizzard, but all that really means is that I cycled to the station through cold and heavy rain before it turned to snow.
Worrying about various things over which I have limited or no control. It doesn’t help, of course.
What’s working
Deciding the evening before what I’ll be writing the next day. Tomorrow I’m going to do another exercise for each of the underpopulated chapters. This is falling apart a little bit because I didn’t type up last week’s work yesterday; I suspect that if I had I’d have something more strategic. But never mind.
Experimenting with
Taking a shower or bath in the evening rather than in the morning. The theory is that it’ll wake me up after work and make my mornings less crowded.
And, if doing anything at all is going to result in my needing a nap, scheduling in the nap and doing the thing. Less depressing than not doing the things.
Thinking about
Negative capability, and the ability to sit with unanswered questions.
Reading
I keep forgetting to report on my Sunday reading. I finished Intimate Jesus (read disconcertingly like a ship manifesto, for those who are familiar with fandom terms: Angel argues with some vehemence that of course Jesus had a sexuality and of course he never did anything with it); the part that will remain with me is the image of St John the Evangelist removing himself from a bath house due to the presence of a heretic therein. Now I’m reading Black, Gay, British, Christian, Queer (Jarel Robinson-Brown), which is excellent, and alternately making me think and making go, ‘yes, exactly!’ It is very refreshing to read something that isn’t just another dissection of the clobber texts.
Writing
See The Good, above.
Mending
Darned one pair of tights and part of a worn bit of a sock. Then the cat jumped into my tea (not very warm by that point) and got tea leaves over everything.
Looking at
St John the Baptist, Somersham. The friendly little fish at the top of this post is decorating the font cover.
Cooking
Cauliflower and parsnip royal korma: a recipe I’ve made several times before, but which seemed to work out better than most previous attempts. I made up the korma spice from this recipe, which worked very well (though I really wouldn’t call it ‘American’ cuisine…).
Eating
A very nice bit of roast lamb. Some very old barszcz from the freezer (I am trying to use up things from the freezer…)
Moving
Full-length morning walks on both my work-from-home days this week.
In the garden
One of the tulips appears to be developing a bud.
Appreciating
Sunshine, both inside and outside a church. Being with other people, but quietly.
Wanting
To have both time and energy when I’m at home.
Line of the week
This is from a 2011 Hidden Europe article on Birmingham’s number 11 bus route.
George and Richard Cadbury – brothers, philanthropists and chocolatiers – knew the ingredients of human happiness: Tudor beams, indoor toilets, decent plumbing, education, the village green and chocolate.
Sunday snippet
From Don’t Quit The Day Job:
You may feel that daydreaming about all this stuff will guarantee that it’s never going to happen. Very natural. But honestly, unless you’re one of the very, very lucky, very, very few, you’re going to be back at your desk, till, or steering wheel tomorrow morning even if you do find yourself achieving something you can legitimately be very proud of.
This coming week
Two days in the office, one evening meeting, two days working from home and then a fasting glucose test. Not looking forward to that last one.
Anything you’d like to share from this week? Any hopes for next week? Share them here!
Week-end: with a bump
The good
One of my friends came over to Ely yesterday and we spent a lovely morning looking around the cathedral and chatting over coffee. I hadn’t seen her since before the pandemic, but she’s one of those people with whom you can pick up – not where you left off, because we were both in different places back then, but where you are now.
The mixed
I tripped (over a paving slab, perhaps, or just over my own feet); fortunately the only damage seems to be a sore knee.
A decision with a deadline, which was dependent on someone else’s decision, which might or might not have been made by the deadline. In the event it was, but I spent a lot of time this week muttering, ‘Someone’s got to drive the bloody train‘ and trying to discern what the right thing to do would have been had the other person not got back to us in time.
The difficult and perplexing
I overdid things last weekend – or all through the week before, really. This week has been a washout. I am telling myself that this is in fact quite different from my post-Covid convalescence: even if doing anything results in falling asleep on the sofa later, at least I am doing things.
What’s working
Sleeping with a pillow between my knees. Changing down a gear lower down the hill (this may also be a metaphor, who knows?)
Reading
Michel the Giant: an African in Greenland (Tété-Michel Kpomassie, translated by James Kirkup). This was a Christmas present from one of my brothers. So far the author has made it to Denmark. I’m reminded of Patrick Leigh Fermor and his endless letters of introduction as he crosses Europe, although Michel is doing a lot more work along the way.
Bureacratising
The corner of doom between the kettle and the toaster.
Watching
Strade Bianche! I hope that poor frightened horse was OK. Various winter sports, all of which I’ve been falling asleep in front of.
Looking at
The cathedral, including some chapels at the east end I hadn’t been in before.
Cooking
Winter vegetable ragout (slow cooker) – turned out more like chunky soup with a pastry hat. Today I’ve been testing the yoghurt function on the Instant Pot. The result is very runny but tastes and smells like yoghurt.
Eating
Nothing terribly interesting. Yesterday’s lunch was a fish finger sandwich with some very nice chips at Riverside Bar and Kitchen.
Noticing
An actual dust bunny (see picture at top of post) on the bathroom wall.
In the garden
The tulips are looking lively, no thanks to me. I find that plum trees should not be pruned, so I shall leave them be – apart from the branch that gets you in the eye when you take things to the compost bin.
Appreciating
Friends. Fellowship. Flop.
Acquisitions
A gizmo to go with another gizmo we already have promised to us. Two trays, two tubs, and two bottles, to keep the doom out of the corner of doom (well, we can hope).
Wanting
To be able to go out for a simple little 50 minute walk and then to be able to stay awake through the rest of the day.
Line of the week
Tété-Michel Kpomassie on the customs he grew up with:
We are brought up in the belief that anyone appropriating an article covered with such signs risks the vengeance of Hêviesso, the lightning god, or of Sakpatê, the earth goddess – represented here by the tuft of grass or the handful of sand – whose punishment comes in the form of smallpox (unfortunately, she forgets that it’s contagious).
This coming week
Nothing very much out of the ordinary. I need to work out how to get to an event on Saturday, and also make a start on writing my lay director’s report.
Anything you’d like to share from this week? Any hopes for next week? Share them here!
Week-(endings and beginnings)
The good
Approximately a week before the world changed three years ago I spent a weekend in Bristol. My stated purpose in being there was to help a friend attend her brother’s wedding, but that turned out to be only a few hours of it. Bristol isn’t a city that I know at all well, but even so, wandering around it on a Sunday morning, meeting up with other friends, I found it reflecting back layers and layers of myself and my past and, in the process, beginning to make sense of a disorientating change of direction that had happened to me a month or so before that.
Something similar happened this weekend, except I wasn’t in Bristol, I was in Winchester. Which is the city of my birth, and one to which I used to return every year in my childhood. It’s been less frequent recently, but this time round it had a lot to say to me. We were there for a ‘just over a year since the funeral’ memorial gathering for my father, but I had fortitously discovered that the Church Times Festival of Faith and Literature was going on at the same time, and we arrived with so much time in hand that I was able to go and look at my childhood home (not that I remember it) too. And once again there was that same sense of gathering up everybody I am and used to be and bringing them together into the same person. So many little messages. The bin, which has somehow survived thirty-four years (and the accompanying reflection that my father was such a personality that even his wheelie bin is identifiable as his thirty-four years later). A Progress Pride flag on the pavement. A labyrinth in the university chapel. Witty and erudite conversations about faith and literature, and remembering that I am after all a person of both. And also bringing that person back into contact with the disreputable bus crew member that I was born and still am. And the sense that my brain is working again. And being able to walk up and down the hills of Winchester without being completely exhausted.
Then the gathering itself was excellent. And I was not as exhausted during it as I feared I might be.
The mixed
I didn’t get really, really tired until South Mimms services on the way home. However, I have been really, really tired today.
The difficult and perplexing
Tedious physical symptoms of the ‘You really don’t want to know’ variety.
What’s working
Exercising my particular skill set in the job for which I am the right person.
Reading
This has been a good week for reading! First there was Hood – a very early Emma Donoghue, from back before she started concentrating on historicals. I found the depiction of the 1990s Irish lesbian scene, of which the narrator both is and isn’t really a member, fascinating; the prose was gorgeous; and the whole thing was satisfyingly messy in ways it’s difficult to do these days without someone on Twitter calling you ‘problematic’. Then I read Golden Hill because one of the speakers at one of the FaithLit sessions I had tickets to was Francis Spufford, and that was just tremendously fun.
I must also mention this delightful paper: Jurassic Pork: What Could A Jewish Time Traveler Eat?
Mending
I darned a hole in the elbow of a pyjama top; another, smaller hole has appeared next it, and another one on the other arm. I’ve done some of the holes in one of Tony’s fancy merino T-shirts too.
Listening to
Catherine Fox and Francis Spufford talking about ‘Real faith in imaginary places’ (which made me think that I really must finish off the Reader’s Gazetteer series) and Jay Hulme and Rachel Mann talking about ‘Mapping a landscape of (un)holy desires’ (which made me think that I really must write about the epiphanies of 2020-date; for the moment I would like to express my gratitude to the audience member who made the point about how desire, in the very broadest sense of the word, is basically seen as unseemly for and therefore irrelevant to Christian women – sing it, sister!) Anyway, I really enjoyed both sessions, and failed to take any notes at all.
Mattins at the cathedral on Sunday morning: a modern but quasi-plainsong Benedicite that I can’t say I really enjoyed, but a Stanford Benedictus and a nice depressing Tudor anthem to make up for it (complete with a story about how the composer of the latter attempted to murder the Dean).
Looking at
The Chinese and British exhibition at the British Library. Predictably, I was most taken by a beautifully detailed dolls’ house Chinese restaurant. Yesterday, aside from significant addresses already mentioned, some new King Alfred buses; the most gloriously impractical family car the six of us ever piled into (before it was returned to its spiritual home); and my grandparents’ and great-grandparents’ grave.
Eating
A most excellent Sunday lunch (I had roast beef) at the Running Horse in Littleton, courtesy of my godfather.
Moving
Not much to report beyond walking around various bits of Winchester.
Noticing
Two horse-drawn vehicles (minus the horses) on the back of a rescue truck. Hares, from the train. A pair of tractors waiting to cross the railway line. Quite a few deer in various Hampshire fields. An advertisement for ‘new almshouses’, which feels most Trollopian. A fox running across the road somewhere north of Royston. I have already mentioned the bin.
Appreciating
My fabulous family and bus crew (this is how my family spells ‘found family’).
Acquisitions
A carful of second-hand baby stuff.
Hankering
Various books I liked the look of but didn’t buy.
Line of the week
From Hood:
The wind was a black cat outside, rattling the chimney and spitting at the windows.
This coming week
I am going to attempt to recover some energy, catch up with some admin, and tidy some more of my study. Looking forward to seeing a friend on Friday.
Anything you’d like to share from last week? Any hopes for this week? Share them here!
Week-end: blooming
The good
Generally encouraging outcome from Monday’s appointment. All seems more or less as it should be.
The days are getting longer, and the mornings are getting lighter, and there are crocuses and winter aconites and pussy willow and one brave daffodil.
The difficult and perplexing
I am not much less tired than I was. It is meant to be passing off by now!
What’s working
Protein, particularly at breakfast. I had cottage cheese on my toast and was amazed by the way I didn’t need to head straight to the canteen for a sausage sandwich upon arrival at work. Now I am investigating protein-rich snacks.
And I’m really enjoying being in the garden.
Experimenting with
Different configurations of pillows. (Tonight: three under my head and one under my top knee. We’ll see how that goes.)
Reading
Notes on ‘Camp’ (Susan Sontag), mostly to see if I had enough brain for theory. On the whole, yes, although I think Sontag is one of the more accessible critics anyway.
I have found several interesting blogs to add to my RSS feed reader. Some of them have not been updated in a while, but the great thing about RSS is that if they are it will show up.
Continuing with These Violent Delights and Death in Cyprus. And I did reread Persuasion, as I’ve been threatening for a few weeks.
Writing
Apparently the book that wants to be written is the book about writing a book when you have a job. So I’m going with that. I’m accumulating a lot of longhand that needs typing up, though I’m not sure when that’s going to happen.
I also saw a call for submissions I liked the look of and wrote a first draft of a poem, which hasn’t happened for a long time. Really not sure if it’s any good or not.
Watching
Continuing to catch up on: Four Continents; Alpine skiing world championships; biathlon world championships.
Looking at
Well, I meant to visit the exhibition on Alexander the Great at the British Library, but I’ve missed it. A combination of meetings running into lunchtime, not being able to remember my password to the online booking system, and general disorganisation.
Cooking
Not a huge amount: a pleasantly stodgy cheese and broccoli pasta bake earlier in the week, and then stuffed peppers (couscous and tomato with harissa) with grilled halloumi yesterday. That was extremely nice.
Eating
Since we were both in Cambridge on Monday, we went to the Haymakers in Chesterton, which used to be our designated local, and had pizza. Mine was a Capricciosa – artichokes, ham, olives, and probably other tasty things I’ve forgotten (it says mushrooms on the menu, but I asked for them to be left off).
Moving
I wish to note that I managed to get my bike all the way up Back Hill without having to get off to push it for the first time in ages. (I often feel that I could do it more often if I only tried a little harder, but by that time in the evening I’m usually short on willpower as well as energy.)
Playing
Attempted an escape room with colleagues; we failed miserably but had fun.
Noticing
A hare, lolloping across a frosty field.
In the garden
The loveliest thing happened yesterday: I was getting the washing in, and three small long-tailed tits came and started pecking away at the suet block, maybe a metre and a half away from me, tops. I waited to get the last few things down from the line until they’d finished.
I finished pruning the last apple tree and had a go at taming the wisteria. Maybe tomorrow I’ll look up what I need to do to plum trees, other than get the vines out of them.
I’m beginning to think about what I want to plant this year. Tarragon, certainly. Maybe I’ll finally manage to keep some parsley alive.
Appreciating
Increased light and warmth. The return of the idea-generating bit of my brain.
Acquisitions
Tickets to a couple of events at the Church Times Faith and Literature festival. I had no idea this was happening until I looked on Winchester Cathedral’s website to see when Evensong was going to be next weekend, since I’m going there for something completely different. The programme is slightly frustrating, in that there are several things I’d like to hear all on at the same time, but since this was an entirely unexpected opportunity I’m not going to complain too much. I just hope I’ll have the energy for it. (Also wish to note that it didn’t even occur to me until several hours later to consider myself a failure for not having made enough of a name as a faithful litterata to have been invited. A couple of years ago it might really have got to me.)
Two cookery books: The Roasting Tin (this might have been last week) and The Pressure Cooker Cookbook. And a recipe binder in the Paperchase closing down sale.
More food containers.
Hankering
Well, I still have the rest of the cupboard to organise.
Line of the week
I really liked this blog post by K. J. Charles.
We see holiness—wonderful things—everywhere, if we only look. Because life is everywhere, although time passes, and babies age, and people and things and ways go and are forgotten. No, not ‘though’. Because the tide is always going out.
Saturday snippet
For the writing a book book:
This is one of those irritating inner voices that is never satisfied. It will move the goalposts to the other end of town if you give it a chance. You? Writing a book? Don’t be ridiculous. That’s for people with… You can fill in your own blanks.
This coming week
More travelling than is really ideal, but not much I can do about that.
Anything you’d like to share from this week? Any hopes for next week? Share them here! Or recommend me protein-rich snacks (I don’t like milky drinks, though).
Week-end: like a mighty tortoise
The good
Tangible signs of progress. Zooming with the family.
The mixed
I always promise myself that I’m not going to look at Twitter during General Synod week, and I always fail miserably in that resolve. This edition’s drama was centred on same-sex couples, marriage/blessings/prayers for. I was reminded of the Futurama episode where one of the presidential candidates thinks the other’s three per cent titanium tax goes too far and the other one thinks it doesn’t go too far enough. Anyhow, we seem to have not ended up with robot Nixon, so that’s something.
For me, it meant some miserable internalised biphobia in the shape of not feeling that I could say much about it at all, on account of having been able to marry who and where I wanted to thirteen and a half years ago.
However, I went to the cathedral this morning and the Dean opened the sermon by reading from the Bishops’ apology to LGBTQI+ people. Of course this document has itself been controversial, and many people have argued that an apology is more or less meaningless without more change than we’ve seen. In the context of this morning, however, it felt immensely powerful. I don’t think I’ve ever turned up – anywhere – to a regular Sunday morning service and heard the word ‘bisexual’ come from the pulpit. It’s amazing how much of a difference it makes, hearing it spelled out in actual words: you are welcome.
Relatedly, my LGBTQ+ History Month interview with my alma mater went live this week.
The difficult and perplexing
Falling into bits of the internet I’d rather not be in, and staying there longer than I wanted to.
What’s working
Understanding that realistically I am not going to get more than two or three things done in a day, and prioritising accordingly.
Experimenting with
The idea that going round in circles in the dark may in fact be a Swiss spiral railway tunnel in which all that faffing around is necessary to get me a few hundred feet further up the mountain.
Reading
Continuing with These Violent Delights. I’ve got behind on Death in Cyprus. I also read (and subscribed on the strength of) an excellent article in the London Review of Books on Twelfth Night and displacement.
Writing
Some gentle fanfic, and a little more on the writing-while-having-a-job workbook thing.
Watching
Why do all the winter sports have major championships at once? Because there are only so many days of winter, I know. It was a rhetorical question. I have the biathlon on at the moment.
Looking at
Model railways. Some on Twitter Model Train Show, some not.
Cooking
Recommendations from commenters: Instant Pot risotto on Monday, and butternut squash and sweet potato soup on Wednesday.
Eating
Falafel wrap from my favourite stall.
Noticing
An excellent smiley baby on the train. Several handsome cats watching goings on from windowsills. A treeful of starlings.
In the garden
A sparrowhawk! (At least, I think it was, based on the Field Guide to the Birds of Britain and Ireland. It was certainly engaging in sparrowhawkish behaviour. Very grainy photo at the top of this post.)
The snowdrops are out, other bulbs are coming up, and I am going to have to pull up a load of wallflowers from between the cracks in the paving stones. This year I’m going to try to remember to save the seeds before more of that happens.
I’ve pruned as much of the last apple tree as I can reach without a stepladder, and hacked off some bits of wisteria in a attempt to keep it to the pergola.
Appreciating
Tony. This week specifically because he has bought me cherry yoghurt, but he’s generally a good thing.
Acquisitions
I managed to buy enough paper tapes in Paperchase’s closing down sale to qualify for a free canvas tote bag. Um.
Yesterday Tony and I went to Cutlacks, the local home and garden shop (Islanders: think Hurst), and bought various things: a shower shelf, some table mats, containers in which to put pearl barley and other grains, a rack to hold the iron. That kind of thing.
I’ve also renewed my subscription to Hidden Europe and pre-ordered Run Away Home.
Hankering
Nothing I didn’t end up buying, I don’t think.
Line of the week
From Devonport (Chloe Honum)
He liked the gulls that stood on the railing,
all puffed up with sky.
Sunday snippet
Sometime’s it’s just nice to be able to do your job, then get to the end of the day and stop. Which sounds insultingly simplistic if you have the kind of job you take home with you, or if you get home and then have to feed five dependant humans and a gerbil and wash up afterwards – but that’s my point.
This coming week
Is a little topsy turvy, due to an appointment and then some frivolity with colleagues. It should all shake down to a quietish weekend.
Anything you’d like to share from this week? Any hopes for next week? Share them here! Or just keep recommending me Instant Pot recipes!
Week-end: jiggety-jig
The good
I very much enjoyed our last couple of days in France – exploring more of Avignon (including the covered market) on foot and by tram, and then visiting Marseille. The latter was very sunny and very windy. We took a bus a little way along the coast so that we could look at the Chateau d’If from the shore. Of course I now need to reread The Count of Monte Cristo, but then I always do.
Also, an extremely positive and useful vision and planning day with my Cursillo committee.
The mixed
I wouldn’t have chosen to take a rail replacement bus at 7.20am – but looking back to see the towers and walls of Avignon sharp against a hazy gold sunrise, and then driving through Tarascon and Beaucaire as it brightened into a clear sunshiny day, with the old walls basking in the light, made it worth it.
Got caught up with work and didn’t make it to Evensong on Thursday. But I learned today that Candlemas was not marked at Evensong on Thursday, so I have in fact been saved disappointment (and other people have objected).
The difficult and perplexing
Dealing with a jam containment failure on the TGV. My fault. Probably.
Not sure I will ever catch up on my emails. Oh well.
What’s working
The lectio divina on community from Fifty Ways To Pray. Embracing the idea that sometimes all choices are good (and therefore that dithering over where to eat lunch is a waste of time).
Reading
At Nîmes station I found a machine that dispensed short stories at the touch of a button. So I pressed the button and received a copy of Fleur Sauvage by Thierry Covolo on a long thin strip of paper.
Since getting back I’ve been pretty tired and have fallen back on Persuasion retellings from the AO3. May reread Persusasion proper. Some good blog posts, too: The Holiest Feast Day of Do-Overs from The Fluent Self, and Admiral Cloudberg was on particularly good form capturing the horrifying inevitability of Carnage on the Autobahn: the crash of Paninternational flight 112.
Watching
The European figure skating championships. I have to say it’s nice to be able to watch the final group in the women’s competition without constantly wondering whether it’s making me complicit in child abuse.
Looking at
More Provençal crib scenes, not to mention the churches that contained them – Ste Marie Majeure and Notre Dame de la Garde in Marseille. I liked them both, flamboyant nineteenth century edifices that they are. Notre Dame de la Garde in particular is quite remarkable. It’s right at the top of the hill (we took the bus up) and even when you’re inside you can hear the wind howling around. It’s more or less wallpapered with votive plaques and representations of Our Lady’s miraculous interventions, including several model boats and aircraft. But particular kudos to Ste Marie Majeure for having an actually convincing flock of sheep in one of its crib scenes.
Cooking
I made jam tarts for Candlemas. (I forget now where I read about this tradition, and it may be a complete myth. Still, at worst I get jam tarts.)
Eating
More delicious French food, including cromesqui (a sort of deep-fried potato ball) and entremets (a cake made of chocolate mousse). Things I’d actually heard of included salmon and poached egg.
Noticing
Cats sitting on the roof of a hire van in a suburb of Avignon. A deer sneaking across the path ahead of me when I went for a walk on Thursday. A bus in Nîmes that thought it was a tram.
Appreciating
Warm blanket, fluffy cat. Bed.
Acquisitions
More badges for the camp blanket (still missing Avignon). Interesting flavoured salt, and truffled olive paste, from the covered market.
Hankering
So much unsuitable cheese. And the wine, too. (We did bring some back for purposes of future celebration.)
Line of the week
From No More Delay: a call to General Synod by Charlie Bell.
The minute we bless same-sex couples, people’s prejudice will be challenged by real, living people, right in front of them, living ordinary, faithful, loving, honest lives of love and faith, to coin a phrase.
This coming week
Back in the office. And maybe I’ll decide what to do with the butternut squash and sweet potato that have been hanging around for ages.
Anything you’d like to share from this week? Any hopes for next week? Share them here!
Week-end: l’on y danse
The good
We are on holiday! We are staying in Avignon and visiting other towns in the vicinity as well. There is a great deal to see and the food is excellent. Also, the sun has mostly been out, and getting more sun was the object of the exercise.
The mixed
There is, inevitably, not enough time to do everything and see anything, and I am compiling a mental list of things we didn’t get round to this time/that were closed for the winter/would have needed a car/etc. So we will just have to come back and take slow trains along the Côte d’Azur/see the Pont du Gard/look for flamingoes in the Camargue.
The difficult and perplexing
It is cold. The place we are staying at is called La Vie de Bohême and my hands are doing the Che manina gelida bit. The mistral is blows straight through me. Just like home, really. But why do all the hand driers in the public lavatories insist on getting in on the act?
What’s working
Trousers over tights. Having a lie-down in the afternoon. Accepting the fact that really any establishment with a menu outside will feed me adequately and will be happy to do so.
Reading
I forgot to mention Winters in the World (Eleanor Parker) – following the cycle of the early mediaeval year and quoting a lot of literature along the way. I’m really enjoying it.
On the e-reader, I have These Violent Delights (Chloe Gong) – Romeo and Juliet, except older and more jaded, in 1920s Shanghai, with monsters and possession (sort of). I’m enjoying the story; the prose tends towards the clumsy (but see below). I’m also continuing with Death in Cyprus and returned to The Master and Margarita (the latter has now shown up). I’m not sure I’m really getting it.
Looking at
Lots of Provençal monuments! We went around the Palais des Papes, and out as far as you can along the famous bridge (there was an exhibition, with quite an interesting film about how they have worked out where the rest of it originally was). This morning in Nîmes we went around the Roman arena and I learned a lot about gladiators, and into the Maison Carrée. This afternoon in Arles we looked at the outside of the Roman arena (two in one day seemed excessive) and through the railings at the theatre.
My favourite thing, though, has been the crib scenes in the churches. The one in the cathedral at Avignon is currently showing a Candlemas scene; the one in Saint-Trophime in Arles is a magnificent multi-level edifice occupying an entire chapel and featuring locals in traditional dress coming to visit the crib. It even has a windmill at the top of the hill.
Eating
I said there’d be pancakes. There have, in fact, been three: one with chilli con carne at My Old Dutch (Chelsea) on Wednesday night; one with ham and Gruyère and an egg on top yesterday lunchtime, and one (‘crêpe Mont Ventoux’) with chestnut and whipped cream and chocolate sauce for pudding yesterday night. That may be enough to be going on with. I have also eaten onion soup (very, very effective when I was tired and cold the night we arrived), lamb stew, and quiche with leeks and bacon. It’s all been delicious.
Moving
Climbing up and down a lot of steps of various antiquity.
Noticing
A set of gallopers with black bulls alongside the usual horses. Young men with a shopping trolley full of puppies (I don’t know why; I hope they meant them no harm). Goats in a garden next the railway. Snow on the ground as we crossed the middle of France on the TGV. Two swans and a cormorant in the Rhône.
Appreciating
Having an apartment to ourselves. The SNCF app (when it’s been working). The friendliness and patience of pretty much everyone we’ve spoken to.
Acquisitions
Badges for my camp blanket (though not, so far, one saying Avignon).
Hankering
I keep passing shops full of soap and hats and shoes, and haven’t gone into any of them. Yet.
Line of the week
One really good one from These Violent Delights:
He was born with pride stitched to his spine.
This coming week
A little longer in France, and then home. I have quite a lot to sort out before next weekend, the beginning of a very busy February.
Anything you’d like to share from this week? Any hopes for next week? Share them here!
Kathleen Jowitt 