Recalled to life ...

We're home again, and it's been a long day, but I need to blip ... That quotation from A Tale of Two Cities that I've purloined for a title seemed to encompass how I feel after 24 hours away. I can't believe it was only yesterday that we left, that I went shopping and all that normal Dunoon stuff and then plunged into the lovely family time we've been able to enjoy. After the wind and rain of yesterday, the sun was shining - we sat on the patio in Newhaven Harbour for our morning tea while Ewan worked for a couple of hours, I believe virtually in South Africa ...

Then the whole gang of us walked along to the Saturday Market in Leith. I've heard it mentioned so often as the origin of delicious things to eat; it's also home to a fair sprinkling of lovely Italian and Sicilian stallholders who greeted our son as if he was a long-lost rellie ... I bought some things; he bought more. We wandered, we looked, we explored back alleys transformed by the need to supply outdoor eating areas. And two things struck me: everywhere I looked, I wanted to take photos. Everything seemed so varied, so colourful, so ... structural. Most of my photos of the past year have been landscapes, seascapes - horizontals everywhere, and the colours of nature. And the second thing was the irony of realising that when someone like, for example, Lady Findhorn, complains of running out of photographic subjects in Edinburgh it's just like me thinking "not another seascape in the clouds ..." .

Back at the house, we had another inspired meal cooked in the time it took me to pack my case, and left as Anna's bassoon teacher arrived for her lesson. This was our cue to head west with a quick detour to visit our grandson who's about to be 11 and had just had what seems to have been an epic birthday party. We left there an hour later with a splendid doggy-bag which we've enjoyed for our supper; we drove home without any hitches in the space of just over 2 hours because we drove straight onto a waiting ferry. It made everything feel more possible again, and very much like being recalled to life.

Blipping my #2 son and his #2 daughter at the market, with an extra of The Shore, both in Leith.