Three Beautiful Things

1. The traffic is so bad that we are just meters behind the bus that passed us at the start of our walk. 2. She asks to be allowed to trim the doll's bangs, which are for now pinned against her felt forehead to set flat. I will probably say yes. 3. We go out to see what we can see in the sky -- we're rolling through some dusty space and there are more meteors than usual. We don't see any of the promised Lyrid shooting stars, but we do see plenty of satellites, and Arcturus is shining straight down our street.

1. Ripe blackberries in April -- just a handful, gleaming in a cardboard tray -- brought in by slow boat from the Mediterranean and put at the front of the fridge to be eaten by anyone who fancies one. 2. Slipping the skins off boiled beetroots -- some for Nana, some for us. 3. A few dozen stitches and her little face appears.

1. Oddly, the burnt corner of my toast with chocolate spread is so delicious that I am jolted out of the story I am reading at breakfast. 2. The taxi driver tells us that now his second son has a university place. 3. We decide we do not like this and drop it mid-show, mid-series.

1. Last day of the holidays, and I've woken very early. I summon up George Saunders' Pond in the Rain  and bob around with his Russians and their short stories before sinking back into sleep. 2. Like a bonfire spark and its afterglow, a yellow centipede returns to the darkness at the bottom of the compost heap. 3. In the hour before bed we let David Attenborough's nesting swallows and path laying mice yank our heart strings around. 

1. Overnight soft and persistent rain has fallen and the town is breathing quietly. 2. The difficult purple of honesty flowers keeps catching my eye. 3. Our turn with the psychologist has arrived very suddenly but we're in a position to seize it with both hands.

1. Through the magic of persisting in poor decisions my Baldur's Gate character ends up with a new eye that can see the invisible. 2. Nick comes back from Lidl with a box of Moomin biscuits just for me. 3. I've had to chase and chase round the internet to get the instructions for a charity shop doll kit. I thought I could guess; but I needed the picture and steps in a 2013 magazine to make sense of the felt circles and limbs and dress pieces.