November 5, 2023
Two disparate events moved me to write this week about the drawbacks of stoicism. First, I completed a round-trip of some 15 hours duration to have Daisy’s (my dog) lameness properly diagnosed by a specialist vet who, rather inconveniently, lives in another country. It turns out that she’s been hiding multiple significant musculoskeletal issues (stoically) […]
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October 22, 2023
In therapy, I am looking out of the window at the gravestones. I didn’t deliberately choose a therapist whose office was in a cemetery but now that I think about it, there is something peaceful and fitting about talking of the past surrounded by the dead. Our conversation is about the need to please my […]
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October 15, 2023
The Sunday I watched my father zipped into a body bag and removed from the living room didn’t seem an obvious point at which there would be a change in the relationship I’d witnessed him have with my mother. That morning, he would have been listening to Brahms or Beethoven, maybe Grieg and watching the […]
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October 8, 2023
A number of things have converged this week causing me to think about how we connect to others and, more specifically, the role that agreeableness plays in doing so. The first was a message from my daughter telling me that she’d split up with her boyfriend. They’ve been trying to address their differences for a […]
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October 7, 2023
On the train, we sit separately because so many people are travelling. From where I am I can look up the carriage towards Martin facing me. He holds up his phone and takes a picture of my withering expression. In these moments I think about how different it could have been had he not stopped […]
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