11am. Changing trains at Richmond, heading down the tunnel that links platforms underground – built on a visually distracting angle, tiles an unnaturally lit shade of blue – I think about how out of place I feel in the urban world most days. Am reading Feral: Rewilding The Land, Sea and Human Life by George Monbiot. It seeps into my thinking and it is extraordinary. This mind feels very, very open.
The past 18 months have taught me much. Old connections have been reforged through werk, all the better for my absence, to be sure. I needed to go away and grow up. Genuine new friendships as an adult are hard to come by, but I have been offered 2 in the past 6 months. The first a fellow cook, a beautiful and very female soul, the other a fledgling connection, an artist described by a critic in a catalogue of a recent-ish solo show of his as a poet of nature. A poet of nature. My heart feels full.
The city's not so bad afterall, but I still long, most days, for the feral, for the wild places of my childhood.