getting on towards the end of winter now. when i go to drive to work in the 6.15 morning the birds are getting up and warming their voices. by the time i get to the bridge the eastern horizon in my mirror is turning from inky black to deep blue. in a few months time when the alarms rings 5.05 the birds will have long finished their good mornings and as i drive towards the bridge the sunglasses will be on.

christmas. last year we spent it in another cold country. this year we will spend it in this cold country.

summer-house holiday. it's usually in the woods, near the woods or through the woods. there is usually water nearby, a clear fresh-water lake or the sea to swim in. sometimes the lake water is brown from the iron in the rocks and the rain washing through the woods. sometimes family flies in from abroad. it nearly always rains and sometimes it storms. we always go picking in the woods, blue berries that bloody the fingers, small wild raspberries with a big taste, porcini (boletus edulis) and chanterelles (cantharellus cibarius) for the butter and garlic in the pan and toast to sit on. it always feels like what it is,a small house in a big country.

she picked raspberries from the allotment on a sunny day and ate them with her brother, the sour ones too. funny, to pick the berries warm and wash them cold.

foreign; after four years it's still foreign

amusement park day-trip. we drove four hours north in a thunderous storm and reckoned with rain coats for the following day. we should have brought umbrellas though, not for the rain which had fled but for shade from the baking sun. he found a strange fruit on the street and held it up as a precious stone, held it in his pocket for weeks together with his pebbles, until one day it was gone.