Welcome to justthoughtsnstuff

I started posting to jtns on 20 February 2010 with just one word, 'Mosaic'. This seemed an appropriate introduction to a blog that would juxtapose fragments of memoir and life-writing. Since 1996, I'd been coming to terms with the consequences of emotional and economic abuse that had begun in childhood, and which, amongst other things, had sought to stifle self-expression. While I'd explored some aspects of my life through fiction and, to a lesser extent, journalism, it was only in 2010 that I felt confident enough to write openly about myself. I believed this was an important part of the healing process. Yet within weeks, the final scenes of my family's fifty-year nightmare started to play themselves out and the purpose of the blog became one of survival through writing. Although some posts are about my family's suffering - most explicitly, Life-Writing Talk, with Reference to Trust: A family story - the majority are about happier subjects (including, Bampton in rural west Oxfordshire, where I live, Oxford, where I work, the seasons and the countryside, walking and cycling) and I hope that these, together with their accompanying photos, are enjoyable and positive. Note: In February 2020, on jtns' tenth birthday, I stopped posting to this blog. It is now a contained work of life-writing about ten years of my life. Frank, 21 February 2020.

New blog: morethoughtsnstuff.com.

Friday, 2 December 2011

wispy bits of mist, americano to go, xmas lights, mad dash


Frosty start to the day. Seasonal. With atmospheric wispy bits of mist above the canal. Not as visible in the photo as they seemed to be in real life, sadly.

Meanwhile, St Giles' was blocked off by the time I was heading to collect my regular Americano to go from Green's. Preparations were underway for an Xmas fair coinciding with turning on the lights. Throughout the day the sound system got tested--lots of muffled noises of the 'one-two, one-two' kind reached my office, interspersed with sudden irruptions of music that shattered the peace before stopping dead.

It was only when I was saying to a colleague at 5 pm that I had to catch my bus that it occurred to me that my bus was not going to be travelling through St Giles'. A speedwalk up Woodstock Road left me collapsing but at least I'm now on my bus.
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