NOTES FROM THE HERMITAGE

In late November 2019, I was diagnosed with depression resulting from burnout. I was signed off work from Boxing Day that year. I ended...

This poem captures a happy moment on the beach while on holiday this summer. The Covid-19 pandemic has reminded us how very precious are...

It seems the moon is in a mischievous mood, playing games with me, a glint in her full eye. This night She swiftly slides behind between...

The moon is spookily yellow and grey, lighting up the eerie clouds behind, surrounded by black expanse. The moon is sepia-tinted,...

Outside the church A cat sits on a headstone. A young cat, lithe and long-legged, Tabby and white, with big cat eyes, fine head. This cat...

It’s been a while. I blame Lockdown 3, and coming out of lockdown, and life in all its unpredictability. But here is a little something...

* Please fill in the blank As you might have noticed, I’ve not written anything for this blog since early November. I‘m not quite sure...

- except the Hokey-Cokey is fun, or was when I was little, and the Covid version is not so much. In, out, in, out - it messes you about....

I’m feeling inspired to walk, these days - and am hoping that inspiration lasts, for the sake not just of my waistline, but of my general...

This is a rather more light-hearted Peak Pondering. On that outing with my parents a few weeks ago, at our cafe stop my mum ordered...

Leaves drop, copper, amber, gold: floating, drifting, heaping up, ready to be swirled by a gust of wind, kicked through by welly-booted...

On my recent visit to the Peak District, my imagination took me to the top of one of the great tors... I want To climb And scramble, Haul...

Berries, fungi, beech husks, moss, bright colours, final flowers... and Jemma the cat overseeing it all, of course!

I recently visited my parents, who live on the edge of the Peak District. On the edge of the Peak sounds like quite a good metaphor for...

According to the Oxford Dictionary, a gallimaufry is “a confused jumble or medley of things”. It can be made plural, apparently, too –...

In 2006 I took part in a week-long sponsored horse ride in Kenya, in an area called Laikipa, to the north east of Mount Kenya. My mind...

I saw a juvenile green woodpecker in my garden the other day. I was on the phone to my mum when I spotted it, so she (being more...

The other day, my mum told me that one day, when she isn’t quite so busy, she is going to get round to reading all the books on her...

It’s been a hot, hot day. I sought the cool of the evening down in the den. I haven’t sat in the den for a while, but though around it...

I‘m good at being in my own company. That’s not to say that I always like my own company: I am entirely capable of irritating myself,...