The Post

It might be old fashioned. And it might be slower than e-mail. But I think there is nothing nicer than getting Real Mail. The post comes very promptly here(very likely that is why it is used by real people and for things other than sending junk and bills), and I am always very pleased to see the postman on his bicycle, or with his trolley of letters. This rambling and incoherant statement to say that today I got a package in the mail and I am Very Happy with it. ! .

You should read...

I was frittering away time in my usual fashion and read these.

The Moment

The moment when, after many years
of hard work and a long voyage
you stand in the centre of your room,
house, half-acre, square mile, island, country,
knowing at last how you got there,
and say, I own this,

is the same moment the trees unloose
their soft arms from around you,
the birds take back their language,
the cliffs fissure and collapse,
the air moves back from you like a wave
and you can’t breathe.

No, they whisper. You own nothing.
You were a visitor, time after time
climbing the hill, planting the flag, proclaiming.
We never belonged to you.
You never found us.
It was always the other way round.

--Margaret Atwood

Onions

The onion loves the onion.
It hugs its many layers,
saying O, O, O,
each vowel smaller
than the last.

Some say it has no heart.
It doesn’t need one.
It surrounds itself,
feels whole. Primordial.
First among vegetables.

If Eve had bitten it
instead of the apple,
how different
Paradise.

--Lorna Crozier

Odd Doings

So, I am in La Place d'Etudier. I am trying to study. I have a fascinating book on the de Brailes Hours open in front of me. Only, I am very much distracted by the booming music filtering over here from Younger Hall where the St. Andrews fashion show is taking place. I looked it up. They are not showing local shops and designers as I thought. They are showing collections by people like Armani. Oh, and I should mention that this is the less important of the two fashion shows that St Andrews does. Next week is the Don't Walk fashion show which raises lots of money - something like 20,000 pounds - for charity. What an odd reputation this university must have.

The Inscrutable Workings of the Unconscious Mind

One of the characters in my dream last night said, "My dear St.John, don't find yourself a clever wife! I assure you, you will quickly find her de trop." Which was such an uncharacteristic sentiment for my brain to produce that I woke up and remembered it.