It was a Cold and Frosty Morning

photographs by me and The Boy

I have recently had two chapters returned to my supervisor, marked 'Redo' so I am desperately trying to rewrite and polish them before I head off to Paris and Budapest for my Christmas holiday.

I am working hard, sometimes clinical, sometimes infatuated by my topic. It's difficult to avoid all the distractions though, the farewell parties and drinks, formal dinners at Colleges, conversations about holidays, romances, the reduction in VAT, and, as always, Africa. Then there's that uneasiness that comes each year with the dark afternoons, when you have to stop yourself from hopping into bed at 5:30pm.

This morning's walk over frozen mud and grass and pools was a nice change, a distraction that was quiet, delicate and primal. Brought me to the feeling of states of nature changing: water turning into solid, breath turning into liquid.

Airfield Adventure

On Sunday, when life felt so much kinder, The Boy and I embarked on a 3 hour walk from my write-up retreat (his parents' house). It was one of the clearest, warmest days of the year.

There was something about the combination of barn houses, poppies, crop fields, a lazy airfield (with your planes, gliders and skydivers) and my obsession with North by Northwest that made our afternoon stroll seem like a film, probably a thriller ending with hand held camera (chasey cam) in the cornfields.