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.

Tuesday 26 April 2016

splendid vetch flowers!, snowdrifts and icy wind, car-stopping blizzard, challenging!


Walking to work yesterday it was grey, sure - but not so grey that spring was obliterated. Before yesterday, I'd not seen such splendid vetch flowers along the Oxford canal, ever! Just wonderful!

But today, the moment I got off the bus at the top of the Woodstock Road I saw little snowdrifts and the wind was icy.

Before a meeting, a colleague told me about standing at the bus stop in Frideswide Square in a car-stopping blizzard at 10.30 last night.

Well, there were moments of beauty this morning but this - hopefully brief - return to winter is challenging, to say the least!
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