Fragments for the beginning of the year

Preparing for my class this evening I came across the poem  Fragments for the End of the Year by Jennifer K Sweeney. I’ve written my own response ( a work in progress but posted all the same).  Fragments for the beginning of the year Though I have changed countries and accents to get here, and been through [...]

Read Full Post »

Christmas: a longing for belongings

Christmas (as in the non-religious celebration of consumption) is designed to compound all fledgling symptoms of nostalgia, homesickness, uprootedness. It’s designed to make you wish for things you didn’t even know you wanted, and more powerfully to wish for things you don’t have, without even knowing what they are! It’s a holiday designed to make [...]

Read Full Post »

Now we see through a glass darkly…

Indeed. Today I started wearing glasses. Full time. This is really unexpected and a bit of a drag. I used to have the best long sight. My kids boasted about my prowess. “My mum can see – like – miles away – she can read signs when we’re driving we didn’t even know were there.” [...]

Read Full Post »

Journey From Hell

READER WARNING Only read this if you’re:- a) a train spotter b) a plane spotter c) any kind of timetable nerd d) hate Ryan Air e) hate the Stansted Express f) hate Stansted airport g) hate the whole public transport system in London h) are just bored h) and i) you live within a 1 [...]

Read Full Post »

Italian Roads Rant

Hmmm…so here we are in the bucolic paradise of Opicina, just 20 mins walk (10 mins cycle ride) from the kids’ lovely school. We travel along winding country lanes bordered with high stone walls, the smells of wisteria and jasmine wafting in the breeze, the buzzing of bees, the chirping of birds to accompany our [...]

Read Full Post »

Il piu’ e il meno

Gardener has just been round with a quote for re-laying the lawn which has blown my head off. “We’re only renting” I splutter”, “Exactly, signora,” he says enigmatically. I had entertained thoughts of digging up an ‘orto’ (vegetable patch) to one side – and putting up a gazebo, planting berries and fruit trees, climbing wisteria [...]

Read Full Post »

Blogging Muse has gone…

Yeah, though I’ve had some time, I’ve really not had the head space. It’s funny what blogging does to you (and here it’s very different from fiction writing). I find myself at various moments throughout the day thinking about how I will translate what I’m feeling/seeing/learning into a blog post (or a twitter – again, another [...]

Read Full Post »

The Meaning of Home

Have been absent from here for a week or more, just after I’d decided (realised yet again) that an hour’s writing and an hour’s jogging every day are what I need to keep me sane and happy (and so it follows that I took a week off running too). My inner saboteur strikes again.  But [...]

Read Full Post »

combaccino

Have decided to start recording in a new category “Learning Italian” – the words and phrases that I overhear or read that I especially like, or didn’t know before. This should be a very good way for me to improve my spoken and written Italian. It also gives me a very valid reason for buying [...]

Read Full Post »

Not so bad…

As per twitter, this morning did not start off too well. Alarm not set, got up half an hour late, then Fran screaming at me about the cakes we must bake and bring to school, Stef stressed, checking the time. But I cook 15 pancakes in 10 minutes, Fran slurs on the Nutella, we get [...]

Read Full Post »