Bit of an understatement there, really. It’s been about 20 months since I last posted anything. I’ve noticed that a lot of bloggers run out of steam after a while and it’s not too surprising. It’s a lot of effort to keep a blog going, especially when you have other things going on in your life.
The last message I posted here was in July 2017. That’s when we moved to live in North Northumberland in the UK. I was born and brought up in Northumberland, very near the coast, and I’ve had a hankering to get back to the place for many years now. And finally, I’ve done it. We live a few minutes walk from the North Sea, and can even see it from the upstairs windows of our house. In the other direction is the mainline railway station on the North/South route from London to Scotland. It’s all stunningly convenient and pleasant, and I’m now back living in a climate that suits me. (It rarely gets hot, usually there’s a cold wind from somewhere, and the rainfall is low – I just love it).
It’s been so long since I blogged that numerous WordPress and other software updates have taken place and I’ve had to download lots of things I don’t yet fully understand. So, I’m going to keep this simple and not try, yet, to upload any photographs or do anything else fancy that will crash the thing.
The other day I was thinking about the last few years, and realised that my recollection of events would be helped by reference to my blog. It’s a kind of diary, and that’s the most useful feature of it for me. I thought originally that it was a means of social media communication, but only on rare occasions has the communication ever been two-way. So I need to rethink my expectations around blogging. Best to think of it as a way of communicating with myself, and recording events and thoughts.
In my absence from the blog I have kept up regular posts on Instagram, so please have a look if you’re reading this and are interested. Instagram is, as a means of communication, preferable to blogging. It’s much less work and hassle and there’s a chance of almost immediate feedback in the form of ‘likes’ and quite often some comments. But I do like writing, so I think I should keep this blog going. As the events recorded in it become more distant over time, the blog becomes more valuable and more interesting to me.