116. The black dog…
Although I’m a glass-half-empty kind of girl, it has to be said that I have been extraordinarily lucky with my lot in life. I’m not stuck on a mountain in Iraq, nor in a refugee camp in Gaza. And when it comes to dealing with the everyday ups and downs, I do have kith and kin who are second to none.
Incidentally, don’t you think that ‘kith’ is a great word? Madam, you have greatly insulted me, so I am going to unkith you from Facebooke.
87. Always something there to remind me…
Thursday afternoon saw me tucked away in the non-contact room, ploughing through assessment results. Depressingly, half the children still remain below the class average, despite Mr Gove’s exhortations. I fear for my salary.
Entering results onto a spreadsheet is a mundane job, so I switched on the wireless; partly to drown out the sound of children in the playground – they do keep turning up at school – but also because I knew that Clare Balding was going to be talking to Tom Isaacs as part of her ‘Ramblings’ series on Radio 4.
71. We are verses out of rhythm; couplets out of time…
The truth is, my anonymous blog is mostly onymous. My family, colleagues and other mates know my secret identity: largely because I’ve told them. In general, I’m pretty rubbish at keeping secrets. No strength of character. Expose me to a child learning the violin and in no time at all, I’ll tell you where the priests are hiding.
63. When I wake up in the morning, love…
Exeter, 1976. DearHeart and I, pens poised to record insights into the poetry of Yeats. Dr Henderson takes off his spectacles and gives us all a Paddington-Bear long-hard-stare.
“I’m going to read you one of Yeats’s greatest poems, Lapis Lazuli. Before I start, can I remind you that the word gay did not, in 1938, have the meaning that it has today. So when I tell you that ‘Hamlet and Lear are gay’, I expect you to react appropriately. Thank you.”
The Jelly Chronicles 