Ah well met my friend, tis indeed been many turns of the Sun since we last sat and chewed upon the cud together is it not. I hope that you are in fine fettle and that the time since we last sat has been kind to your good self. Myself?, oh there has been a few moments that hung heavy and dark that I could talk about if I was so minded, but I think we should perhaps talk of simpler, more grounding moments that are more befitting of these longer and warmer days. After all at times all it takes is a few words carefully chosen to either ruin or make one’s day does it not?

I must confess to you that since we last spoke I have spent many hours thinking about my life’s direction of late and the negatives along with the positives that shape its course. I guess we can all think of events, good or bad, that have shaped us to the person we are at this very point in time. Whilst contemplating the path behind me I have come to realise that I have let so many issues, whether they be relationships, work pressure, family expectations or a whole host of other of life’s paraphernalia, push my life around like a leave floating upon an ocean at the mercy of currents, tides and the four winds with no form of steerage available to me. This time when looking back upon the road have I come to realise that most of what pushes my wayward path has only had such affect because I let it. In the past I have always tried to do right by others with no thought upon how they were treating me. It was only when rebuilding my mind after it fell into the darkness did I come to realise that I cannot please everyone, that the world cannot be changed by one person and that all the damned guilt that I shall always carry with me for past deeds should not drag me back to the abyss but should rather serve as a reminder to live my life with honor and value every moment. The past has gone and unless I am very much mistaken my friend it cannot be changed but only learnt from.

     So where do you find the best place for contemplating the past my friend? For me it has turned out to be in the soil of the earth. I have taken the time to tend my allotment and my garden of late, and being in contact with the soil brings so many goodly feelings to me:- a sense of peace as I turn the soil, of expectation as seeds are sown, of delight as the first shoots push their tips from the soil to bask in the sunlight, of wonder as I become more and more excepted by the wildlife that visits my gardens until I feel part of something vast and beautiful, of humbleness as the power of the weather tans my skin a leathery brown and the winds and the rain caress my upturned face. There is so much more joy and peace to be found whilst grounding oneself and slowly becoming more in tune with the seasons that what a ‘normal & expected lifestyle’ would ever allow. I am fast becoming to believe that for our own sanity we should be slowing down and trying to reach back to simpler times rather than this headlong rush to a lemming like self destruction via ‘faster, better, bigger, more’ that this species seems to crave for. 

     So it has indeed been the grounding of my whole being whist in contact with the soil that has enabled myself to pause for thought and perhaps place a hand upon the tiller of my life’s direction. A simpler and slower path is where I am heading, ridding myself of unnecessary material possessions or the desire for them, of being more in contact with the soil, of leading a simple and honorable life. Not to atone for past mistakes though my friend, but rather to let my mind find peace and allow me to be the person I should have been many years ago. Ah the hour to take my leave of you has come all to soon, until next we have time to while away some moments may peace be yours my friend.