Three Beautiful Things

1. To start the day by finishing a book. 2. I'm sure we knew that the emergency kettle is a whistling one; but we'd forgotten since we last had it out, and it's a pleasant surprise to hear it calling from the stove top. 3. Sunday afternoon pause: no pressure to browse and buy.

1. Decongestants are a modern-day miracle. 2. As I wave her off, two things happen: our neighbour's daughter comes out of their front door; and a blue tit stops to investigate the tree in our front garden. 3. Watching a lot of builders in orange hi-vis and plumbers in matching T-shirts and a truck driver in green hi-vis negotiating the wheres and hows of a large delivery of boards and insulation.

1. Coffee with a few editor friends in the bright and airy auction house. The hour vanishes among a good brew and useful talk. 2. Suddenly, there are dog violets growing under the door step and between my herbs. 3. From among the washing up, the scent of the green tea I drank earlier.  

1. Setting off on a train with some things to read and a bit of an adventure ahead. 2. I meet film editors, and script editors and all sorts of different people who tell me about their world, which as it turns out, has some similarities to mine. Occasionally trays of sushi and glasses of fizz appear at our elbows.   3. Stepping out of a hot room into the cool night, when a light rain is falling. Time to process what I've heard.

1. Gorse is always in flower, as everyone who lives near heathland knows, but this week, on the sunny side at least, it's changing from green spiny thickets with the odd blossom to a grand show of solid yellow. 2. The way the dust and flick disappear into the vacuum cleaner. 3. On a whim, I drop bright coloured hundreds and thousands into his bowl of custard.

1. I've had half an eye on the forsythia bush over the car park -- and now it's got yellow stars all over, with more to come no doubt. 2. I'm trying to explain why I thought of using a mirror to bounce the view from the window into a more convenient spot in the room. 'Like in The Lady of Shallot. She lives in a tower doing weaving and she's not allowed to look out of the window, except through a mirror. Only she sees Sir Lancelot and looks out of the window anyway and then she dies. It's very sad.' I slip him a copy of Tennyson's poem, with Charles Keeping's evocative pencil washy illos. The view from the window is forgotten. 3. I teach her how to knead her pizza dough, and explain that it helped me to manage my angry feelings during lockdown.  'But who were you angry with? You were just with us all the time!'

1. I'm mostly at my desk today -- but with the window cracked open, I can see the springtime light, and smell the sunlit air. 2. We slip out for a coffee and nosey in the bookshop -- I'm just pleased to have Nick all to myself. 3. A friend and I go along to a showcase for a comedy course we couldn't attend, and it's glorious -- a couple of hours of funny stories, word play and personal revelations.