The half year review

It's almost six months since my fortieth birthday, so it seemed appropriate to sit and rest a while and observe the vista from atop the early gentle foothills of middle age. Or middle youth. Or Middle Earth. Or whatever we like to call this large expanse of green and beige crimplene that lies in front of us when our twenties and thirties are left behind.

Some observations then from the watch tower half a year in to the second act:

Watching the birds, thinking, monitoring the progress of the new plants in my little garden, revelling in the natural world more joyfully with each day that passes - and the continued enjoyment of my constant companion nicotine - seem to have replaced in my mind the space previously occupied by preoccupations of a more earthy kind. Whether that is to do with being 40 or with being single for nearly two years or a combination of both is a moot point. This doesn't concern me; I know that if the setting and the situation and the person were right, the old Eve would reassert herself. What I do wonder, though, is whether she can happily coexist with these other natural pleasures.

Having a complete absence of concern relating to what some might call status is by no means a new arrival on my shores but is more pronounced now in its presence. I care not for work, but I don't loathe it either, and perhaps on my better days have attained a Swiss-like neutrality about the whole concept. Work - and the workplace - are funny strange chimeras, occupying so much time and space in the emotions of those in their thrall that they can drive out almost everything else. And I do feel ok about saying that because I've been there myself in the past and like all reformed addicts can see the effects quite plainly in others whilst they remain oblivious. This is probably enhanced by observing the red teeth and claws of others and feeling overwhelmingly free by comparison. A delightful feeling, as is - at last - having mastered the art of relaxation.

Thinking about what I might do next has also been much on my mind recently, the next in my terms being the immediate future and the slightly more distant afterwards when the barn has sold and I'm free of those financial obligations. I am planning - this long bank holiday weekend in fact - to apply for a place on a part-time MA course at a local university. If I'm lucky enough to be offered a place, then two years of part-time study lies ahead with all of the excitement and learning that would offer. Quite by chance, that two years of study would conclude at the exact same moment as the contract for my current job ends. It might also - fingers crossed - include the time period during which the barn sells. So my landscape two years from now could look significantly different.

On the family front, it's nearing the end of the first academic year that Roo has been at university and the first time that I've lived completely on my own - ever - as an adult. In some ways, Roo turning twenty last month was more significant than me turning 40 and I think, not for the first time, about how time really does fly. Tempus fugit. Yes indeed, with bells and whistles on.

I also seem to have inadvertently performed major brain surgery on my computer this evening. Serves me right for following the primrose path of procrastination and random meanderings when I should be working on those assessments.

Photo of an Arctic Tern chick taken last year on the Farne Islands, Northumberland.