Writes of Passage.

                          The Bridge to Nowhere, Belhaven Bay.

So my friends, 2012 passes and despite adverse predictions we’ve made it to the end. Is it a time to look back or a time to look forward I wonder? I could certainly look back at a year filled with catastrophic natural phenomena and self-inflicted human disasters, yet another year of self-serving, lying, mendacious politicians, senseless celebrities, widening economic recession and more than a few needless tragedies, I would also need to take time to celebrate a year of creativity, compassion and human achievement, to welcome the potential of new generations and mourn the passing of old ones. But such things are better said in better places than this wee blog and by folk better at it than I, so let me keep it personal.
 

If I had to label the year I’d put it down as a year of change. When it started I was long term unemployed and despairing after many hundreds of job applications seemed to be getting me precisely nowhere. Then a job came out of the blue. I now work full time for a charity supporting people suffering from autistic spectrum conditions. The money is rubbish but the job is great and rewarding in ways not experienced before, working as I did for a huge private sector company. Having said that I also have to live in the real world and reality tells me that without more income something is going to have to give. That decision will be one of the key challenges of 2013

The Lovely G and Jess

 

My Lovely G has been ill for quite some time and although thankfully she is slowly getting better, there has been stress and worry for both of us as well as yet another hit on finances to cope with. Luckily we have been able to offset impact with canny financial planning – all down to G – and that has helped tremendously. She has been helped by some great people in the NHS but undoubtedly there is a long road ahead. This year has proven how close we are and how good we are for each other. That’s the major plus to be taken from the year I think. That strength will carry us through anything. Health wise my type 2 diabetes has kick started a change in me and I'm now wearing trousers six inches smaller in waist size. It's been quite a thrill buying clothes that are smaller sizes I can tell you. I can't remember ever having been able to do that before. Hopefully that will continue too - but Christmas has taken a temporary toll I'm afraid.

 

I’ve taken on an additional role within Children’s Hearings, a voluntary organisation I’ve worked with for ten years, protecting vulnerable children in the local area. So far the impact has been noticeable but fairly low level but there are major changes afoot that I can see will take significant attention to get through across the first half of 2013.

Our niece Emily who arrived in March.

 

The major impact from all of these has been a loss of  that ‘free’ time which I had a huge overabundance of previously and time that was often given over to blogging. Can you believe it will soon be FOUR YEARS since this wee blog started? Phew! - and there have been almost 600 posts too! 

Time for blogging and indeed inspiration for blogging has been much missing in the latter stages of this year and I'm sorry about that. I miss it.  I’ve often relied on the weekly ‘Sunday Post’ poems to keep things ticking over, not something I’d ever planned. They were always meant to be a wee ‘extra’ not the main event. Still, I’ve been glad to have them on many occasions as they’ve kept some kind of forward momentum. That’s been a worry and I’ve by turns felt lazy or guilty for not being as involved with writing as I had been. I gave serious consideration over the last few months to stopping. What’s the point of a blog if you don’t actually blog? Strangely, when I was in the throes of pondering just that a fellow blogger pal posted on exactly the same thing and she worked through the reasons why she should keep going. That saved me a lot of work and showed me that as usual, I’m not - and we’re not - alone in facing these kinds of challenges. She came to the conclusion that we write ultimately for ourselves and our own pleasure, not solely for others. Comments and interaction, feedback and followers are a welcome and even treasured part of blogging but ultimately she identified that it’s something in ourselves that propels the need to get something down on paper not just in doing so for others. So thank you Jane at ‘What’s making me feel good today’ for sorting out some of those niggles that had been troubling me. There are times when we can and will write and times when quite simply we can’t and we shouldn’t cut off the chosen medium for what may be a short term issue. Even if it’s not short term, if the quality of what is written is satisfying and therapeutic to us as writers then isn’t that all the justification we should need. 

And so ‘Crivens Jings’ will definitely be staying. I’ve programmed the next three months of Sunday posts already and have more poems in the pipeline. I’ll be blogging ‘properly’ when I have time and I have something to say and just as importantly I’ll be reading and commenting on the blogs I follow regardless { something that’s also been remiss recently – commenting, not reading folks!}

The two of us at my niece's wedding

 

But for now I’m going to have to go. I truly hope you have a happy, healthy and prosperous New Year wherever you may be. Take care of yourselves and I’ll be seeing you all again in 2013.

 

Happy Hogmanay!

 

Here’s tae us!

Wha’s like us?

Damn few!

And they’re a’ deid!

 

Slainte!

 

Listening to: