Living Between the Lines
A wry look at family life
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Listen, it’s what you make of it…
“You never know what the year will bring. I mean, ever since that incident with Olive and the baubles, I really feel I want to move,” Thus ran the conversation overheard during our New Year Celebrations at the local pub. Try as I might, I could not hear the rest of the conversation but I whipped out my phone and began typing away in ‘notes’ so I would not forget this gem that had dropped, unasked, into my lap. “Who are you texting?” asked my husband. “No one!” I hissed. I tapped the words into my phone and closed it, slipping it into my bag. That conversation or part conversation…
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A round of applause for DPD and “Garry”!
I do not jest. In years gone by, I gritted my teeth as I staggered round the shops with my merry load of gifts and festive fayre. The novelty of browsing for special gifts for that special someone, began to wear a tad thin after hours of trekking through shopping precincts and department stores. It was tiring, trawling the small boutiques and quaint, out-of-the-way shops that stock that something-a-little-bit-different, whilst accompanied by a few thousand other people, bent on the same task. Shopping was a mixture of fun, tinged with exhaustion as I remember it, when the children were small. A trip to Argos to pick up that longed for…
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In the Woods
“I’m completely lost,” The disembodied voice reaching my ears sounds a little desperate. I walk a little way into the wood and come across a large, border collie attached to an extendible lead. Surely the voice doesn’t belong to him? My eyes run the length of the lead until they alight on a somewhat rotund, figure emerging from some bushes. “Oh, hello—Darcy has got me completely and utterly lost—one minute we were on the path, the next he took me on so many twists and turns, I have no idea where I am, truly.” The lady looks quite happy to be lost, quite jovial even but I sense her confusion…
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Dear Me
A letter to my 2013 self Dear Me, I am writing this from the future. It is 2020 and I am sitting in my study, looking at a shelf that is practically bending beneath the weight of published novels—my name on each. Wow! The first one I spy, I remember starting way back in 2012 through NaNoWriMo. I made a pretty good job of that but by June 2013, so much had happened to thwart its progress, it languished, forgotten, on my computer for a while. I recall that I was a wee bit tired and felt powerless. Remember how I had to weigh socks and could not lift more…
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Life in the slow lane
I am living life in the slow lane. I have only just realised it. We’ll get to exactly how I noticed it in a minute. There is no rush. No, honestly, it will wait. The thing is, when the consultant advised me to do nothing for 6 weeks and possibly repeat this ‘doing nothing’ for a further 6 weeks, I was quite looking forward to it. I saw myself reading, writing, knitting, (yes, knitting) and letting everyone else do the work. It sounded great. It sounded easy. Let me tell you, IT WAS NOT EASY. (Sorry to shout) Now, there will be others who have had to do nothing for…
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Newsflash!
Baby Arthur Bear Geoffrey John, has arrived. Two and a half weeks early, weighing 6lbs 6oz with a shock of black hair, he arrived at 12.08pm on 4th August 2013. This little corker is our fourth grandson and the first child for Zoe and Rhys who, though exhausted, are over the moon. So, without further ado, here is little Arthur and his proud Grandma and Granddad. 🙂
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The Girl in the Red Towel
From the minute she placed one, inelegant, bare foot on the restaurant steps, she was bound to be caught. Not everyone could see her as yet. The crowded, Portuguese/Italian, restaurant spanned two streets with an entrance set at either end. Long and narrow, it afforded a central rite of passage, flanked by tables spreading out each side and set between tall pillars. We heard, rather than saw her entrance. The girl was apparently falling down the steps judging from the kerfuffle around her. A low murmur erupted from those tables closest. Hidden behind our own pillar, we waited. Muted murmurings reached us from the inner sanctum of the restaurant. Her…
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Inci-dental Moments
If I was to give myself ‘lines’ to write this week, they would be: I must pay attention. I must not day-dream. I will do better. Now, that is an affirmation of sorts isn’t it? So, you may well ask, what brings on this need to self-scold? Well, we all do things that embarrass us from time to time don’t we? I know I do and quite honestly, if I paid more attention I could save my blushes. E.g. Earlier this month: I left the driver’s door wide open while I took elderly mother-in-law and toddler grandson into Sainsbury’s supermarket. I didn’t know I had done this of course. Even…
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Fitting out, Sailors, Tea Ladies and Euphamisms
A Bank holiday weekend, in gorgeous Fowey, was full of surprises. We arrived expecting rain but were met with blue skies and sunshine. It may not have been the weather for lazing on the beach but it was pleasant and warm in sheltered parts. We had arrived towards evening and my husband had booked a meal at the local sailing club for our party of three. He had also issued an invitation to a friend who was delighted to accept. Thus, we wandered down at the appointed time. Our friend, who lives in Fowey, was already there. “Did you know it was a Fitting Out dinner?” she asked us with…
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Losing the plot
I have been writing a synopsis of my latest novel. This exercise, undertaken only once the novel had reached a stalemate, has been strategically planned to enable me to see what the heck is going on. This novel was started under the banner of NaNoWriMNo. It grew to well over 50,000 words in 30 days. It spoke, it breathed, it fairly flew off my fingers and onto the screen as I typed. It made sense, well, no, actually it didn’t make all that much sense but it had lots of hooks and notes in the margins and helpful inserts/guides for me to follow when, released from the pressure of that…
