stories and lentils

I feel as if I have had so very little time to write recently. It’s a source of great frustration that when I feel most inspired is often when I am the busiest and when I finally sit down to write, all the tiny scraps of paper with my hastily scribbled notes on have long since disappeared into the debris of our home. Two lines of sudden inspiration in biro lost somewhere among the vegetables piled in baskets, the crockery, a chipped bowl full of lose change and hairbands, tea bags and jars full of pasta… Clutter and mess. A whole other story. Anyway, here I am, home alone with a filthy kitchen but time to write. This summer I yearned for home. I’ve written about this before but I will do again, I'm sorry if it is repetitive but perhaps it's just a song I'll always have for all the places I have called home in England. I’ve dreamt of afternoons in a pub with a pint of cider. I missed charity shops and bookshops brimming with books that aren’t written in the ‘pass...

It’s really summer now. Hot days and no rain. The storms have ceased and the grass is baking, streams are slowing, cicadas buzzing and only butterflies and lizards dance through the scorching midday hours. The bright yellow maze of broom on the hillside has disappeared and been replaced by the scent of lavender growing at the foot of the hilltop chapel. The girls are covered with grazes and bruises from long days of bare legs and trips and falls. The quiet of the morning is disturbed only by the sound of bells as a herd of goats and sheep graze through the green areas and along the river banks that run through the village. Earlier this summer the poplar trees shed their cotton-like seed tufts. Swirling snow storms of soft white silk catching the sunlight, caught by the outstretched hands of children, gathered to make beds for fairies or to delight in smoothing it gently across their faces. Days flow from one to the next: Hands stained purple with elderberries cooked up ...