Category Archives: memoir

…break or be broken

14.Have you ever been in a relationship where the pressure builds incrementally until you want to tear it apart, just to see what remaining fragments are important to you? Have you ever picked a groundless fight, or maintained your rightness when you knew you were wrong, or pushed and pushed to see how far youContinue reading “…break or be broken”

…still life with Frida

13.Each morning you visit the cupboard to fetch the things you need for physiotherapy. If you’re away from home for more than a day or two you take them with you, but otherwise they stay tucked away, out of sight. Some of them you’d have to explain, some are perfectly normal things that you’d findContinue reading “…still life with Frida”

…sewing for self-isolation

11.You have been wearing the same clothes for most of your life, but now they lie torn and tattered across the floor, no longer recognisable as clothes at all. These were the clothes of a mother and a teacher, clothes to keep warm in a draughty cottage, clothes of a certain kind of friend, aContinue reading “…sewing for self-isolation”

…to be human

10.Anyone who is currently ill, afraid or anxious, whatever the reason, this is for youIf you’re experiencing loss, separation or loneliness, whatever the reason, this is for youAnyone who is angry, frustrated or bored, whatever the reason, this is for you Allow yourself to feel these things, allow yourself to be humanthen step away, observe,Continue reading “…to be human”

…insights on inner listening

9.‘The stress of attaching to the experiences of all our days since birth keeps the attention confused, entranced, bewildered.’ You read this in the small square book you brought home several weeks ago. The beauty and truth of this sentence prompts you to look up, to pause and sit for a while. You’ve always believedContinue reading “…insights on inner listening”