Distant memories

It's been so long since I came here, I almost forgot why I started this off in the first place. It seems like another world, a simpler time, when my biggest worry was where my next big meal would be and how much grappa I could sample afterwards.

Not that I really have anything more important to trouble my mind nowadays. It's just that everything seems that bit more difficult. Two children, bills to pay and that thing all men must try to duck and avoid - responsibility.

I'm not going to pretend it has been plain sailing. I have had some bad times in these first years of parenthood. I don't cope well with a lack of sleep, I miss being able to pretty much suit myself what I watch on television, listen to in the car or do at weekends. Sometimes I forget the payback for these little sacrifices and my life looks bleak.

But I wanted to come back to this blog when I was in a better place than I have been of late and that mood has landed on me tonight. It is pouring with rain outside - as it has for most of this Scottish summer - but I don't care much. Something inside my brain has clicked onto a positive setting for the time being and I am going to enjoy it for as long as it lasts. I know there will be other fights with the darkness to come.

Above all, I want to get back to my writing. There are ideas rattling around inside me bursting to get out. Who knows, some of them may even be worthwhile. The clock is counting down to 40 and a certain urgency seems to be pressing me onwards. Since ever I can remember this has been what has driven me forward - a love of words, of storytelling and trying to put a structure on the chaos of existence.

So let's get on with it once again.