It’s Just a Piece of Metal
September 8, 2024 No Comments27th October 2019 One of my favourite Mike stories, dating from before I met him, was frequently regaled in family conversations. I am sure that over almost thirty years, the story popped up at least once a year. More often after the kids were born. It made it onto the “Stories of Mike” CD Mike […]
Read MoreRunning on Purpose_v2
September 8, 2024 No Comments21 October 2019 Today would be 32 years since my first date with Mike. This is the second time I have written a blogpost with the exact same title. Hence the _v2. The first was on my work website and was written on 7th June 2014. I had just completed a 36 km mountain trail […]
Read MoreRicochet
September 8, 2024 No Comments13th October 2019 Today is one of those exquisitely beautiful, bright autumn days. With temperatures that would feel “just right” on a mid-summer’s day, but with the added benefit of a gentle breeze to doubly kiss my bare skin as I sit now, in the garden, writing this piece. I have been out on a […]
Read MoreThe Shape of You in Me
September 8, 2024 No Comments10th October 2019 Megan Devine Writing Prompt inviting us to explore the theme of how I am different because you were part of my life. The invisible causes changes in the visibleThe visible gives evidence of the invisibleHistory influences the present and the futureYour presence in my life carries onWith me, within me, through meHow […]
Read MoreBaby Blue Shoes
September 8, 2024 1 Comment8th October 2019 Megan Devine Writing Prompt inviting us to pick an “ordinary” item and begin writing, “I remember”. I remember your first pair of shoes. Real shoes for walking. Tried on in a proper shoe shop. Designed to support your baby feet while you learned to walk on two legs not four, and to […]
Read MoreWrite & Wrong
September 8, 2024 No Comments7 October 2019 Megan Devine inviting us to respond to John O’Donohue’s poem “For Grief” Write & Wrong: There’s Nothing Quite Like a bit of Black and White Thinking Megan Devine is quite right. Sometimes John O’Donohue writes right, and sometimes he writes wrong. Plain wrong. Irritatingly. Infuriatingly wrong. What is he on? To write […]
Read MoreThe Grief See-Saw Roundabout
September 8, 2024 No Comments6 October 2019 Writing Prompt from Megan Devine: What’s it like to experience that deep kind of connection or love, and then shift back again into pain? I have in my mind’s eye one of those playground attractionsA blend of a see-saw and a roundaboutThey actually do existI have been on at least one – […]
Read MoreHow Would You Love Me In This, Julia?
September 8, 2024 No Comments3rd October 2019 Megan Devine Writing Your Grief prompt inviting us to borrow love; to see ourselves through the eyes of the one we have lost, and imagine how they would tend to us in our pain. How would you love me in this, Julia? If I imagine you speaking, if I imagine you loving […]
Read MoreAnd Then What Happened?
September 8, 2024 No Comments2 October 2019 Megan Devine Prompt from Writing Your Grief Course inviting us to imagine what happens at the moment of death, and to speak in the voice of the person we lost. We had a poem, “The Wild Iris” by American Poet Louise Gluck as a starting point, from which I chose a starting […]
Read MoreBaby Doll
September 8, 2024 2 Comments1st October 2019 Hastily typed-up notes on awakening this morning Waking suddenly just now at 5h18 after another shockingly interrupted and bad night’s sleep. In my dream I was in a bus and a baby-ish version of Julia was lying down next to me. She had taken her life and so was dead but she […]
Read More