A rebel without a clue.

First morning of three with Ruby and Lola. I was going to collect Ruby and bring her back here, but that would be stupid with my poor left foot. A combination of things mean I was walking barefoot in the park yesterday. So once Lola arrives we'll go up to Chestnut Avenue. The allotment will need to go to the back of the queue for the remainder of the week, until at least Friday, but I did quite a lot yesterday. Yesterday afternoon I found myself skipping through The Moon and Six Pence , which is a delightful novel, but I thought it was a story based on Paul Cezanne which is not the case. It's a narrative based on the life of Paul Gauguin... Both important Postimpressionist artists. It doesn't matter which of these two giants of the painting landscape it is a tale told about as it's nothing other than a novel by Somerset Maugham... Mother is suffering from old age: is this what happens to us all? In the end we dissolve back into the dust we came? Obviously it is! Mike su...

Another way is opening up before me: I can see it and must grasp it. The world is such a large place and I've simply got to be in it once more. Disassociation. I've not felt I am looking out of another person's eyes in a long time... and I don't think it's a bad feeling! This Leeds, this Pret , this seven to eight rush hour. This Monday of brief glances from those who have been hemmed into public transport for half an hour, an hour or several. Another working week yearning for the Carrot of Freedom. I have touched freedom and it usually sits on my shoulders, in the form of a rucksack, and distorting my tendons and bones and reminding me I am not a body! At eight I'm heading to Wetherby for four nights to dog sit for Mo and Tony - Ruby. However mum's hip is playing up now - a consequence of the new knee - so I also have Lola along for the week. Fifteen minutes to watch these comings and goings and 'people watch', a Bircher yogurt with seeds and a rasp...

Just going on seven and Lola is happily positioned between my legs. She stayed in her own bed until 6 and she's just had breakfast. Another day crisp and blue, but no rain again. A very dry month so far. My water butt is dry as a bone, luckily there is the one next to Janet and Leslie which is full to overflowing. I am going to walk up there with Lola around 8 and then head back to Leeds for this afternoon and evening. Got Ruby from early on Tuesday until Thursday so I will have two clever girls out with me twice a day for those three days. Yesterday I spent 3 hours on the allotment weeding and banking up the potatoes which are showing because it's going to get cool midweek. Went to the Brewery yesterday and ummed and arred about getting a burger. Mum had baked a chicken so I made a chicken sandwich instead as I'd already spent quite enough on beer. The final few days of April and I'm seriously short on funds until May... I do spend too much on beer. It's too expens...

Teaching Lola a new trick: waiting until seven for breakfast, regardless of how hungry she may be? She's pestered me, but now is curled up in her seat. She pawed me and crawled over me: insinuated herself quite obviously. Then she sits upright and thoughtful for a moment... As though she's learning something. She seems to be quizzical at this moment. It's an expression I like in her. Time must be very different for her to me. She's quite vocal when she wants something: whether to go outside for toilet, wants a rub, cuddle or another closeness, and when she's 'starving' she's yawny and stares directly at me. But I think I've conquered her expectation? Same too in bed. She joins me for a bit then I tell her firmly to go back to her space when we're having a 'sleep over' - there was a time when we shared a double bed, but now I put her large double duvet and smaller matress next to the single one in my old room (having removed the base of th...

A slow down Friday. Mostly I was yawning yesterday, after leaving Lola and mother. The past two days I'd done a lot of digging and, surprisingly, my hands are not so painful as they have been, but I've started to take vitamin D again, after a little gap while I was walking in France (and feeling that there must be enough sunlight pouring forth now we've passed equinox)? Yesterday my left foot was terribly painful and I read that the problem may be Metatarsalgia which if causing the issue, but what can I do except rest the foot. I am currently waiting for some physiotherapy on my right knee so perhaps I can also discuss the tenderness then? Walking is the thing which keeps me together and without it I struggle to comprehend life. The limitation of my being would definitely return me to the depressed state I was in previously - when I could see no means of leaving my unhappy existence other than by a noose. Age related injuries, walking through Köln in 2013 carrying too much ...

This morning I didn't write much before mother, and her crippled body, descended the stairway and put a stop to the journal I keep. On the X99, which is running a little late, we are passing The Windmill pub on a glorious Thursday afternoon. It might be filled to the rafters with school kids upstairs, but that is OK as downstairs is fairly civilised and quiet (except for the Kurdish (???) lady who sells the Big Issue in the Market Place in Wetherby and a couple of octogenarians - with masks still in place - who whitter constantly). We're heading up Langwith Hill, Collingham, where I once delivered mail and once asked, in utter desperation, to go for a poo-poo in a residence I delivered to off Hillcrest. That was such a long time ago: during Foot and Mouth. The Rapeseed in the field by the turning onto Crabtree Lane is the brightest yellow. It's a wonderful day. This morning was still too cold for tomatoes, and there was a slight frost in Yorkshire... I hope it wasn't on...

Crawling into bed at 18:20 because there is nothing else I feel like doing in the flat, after I ate dinner, put my dry clothes and drying rack away, washed and dried the pots, utensils and cutlery. Picked up two bags of Main Crop potatoes to get into the ground shortly - Desirée and Maris Pipers - from Wilko's around four and negotiated the meaninglessness on the streets between Albion Street and Lovell Park. Sirens outside the flat, tailbacks along Lincoln Green Road, etc, a sullen grey sky and noise from the inhabitants around me and from the dicky lift. It's possible to get used to anything? At 18:30 I am going to meditate... ... I don't feel lonely lied on my own listening to the noises around the flat, and I never feel alone when I am walking in the countryside. Yesterday the singing of birds (and now they start to permeate and interject with the motor vehicle drone) and the bright roadside blooms made me joyous. *** To live too long makes us forget the mea...