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I don’t intend to write much tonight. What’s that I hear? A sigh of relief rising from the homes of all 50-odd of my readers? How very rude.

Isn’t it funny how, when you’re on holiday, and your brain is allowed to float and think of nothing in particular, ideas bubble to the surface like iridescent goldfish breath and threaten to burst and perish there if you don’t act in time and cup them gently in your hand and nourish them with your attention? Back home, with the meals and the laundry and the shopping and all the other obligations, thoughts are crowded out. That’s why it’s important to be bored from time to time and let the mental goldfish swim.

I feel a little emotionally drained tonight. My lovely space cadet child has returned from Andalusia and departed for Normandy in the space of less than 24 hours. I miss her. I missed her last week and I’m going to miss her cheeky anecdotes and posturing this week.

Her absence is a reminder that her brother will be off in just over a month and that’s upsetting too because they are side effects of all the thought and care that has gone into nurturing them so that they can eventually stand for themselves, independent beings with their own opinions and their own lives. I find myself wishing that they were still toddlers: the BW the sunny temperamented singer of Sinatra and the far more serious MsDD, their soft skin and chubby little wrists. Full of promise, of my ideas for them. They’re still full of promise of course, but with their own ideas. Which is how it should be but it propels them away.

Ah wistful thoughts. Time for bed.

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