Booterstown Swans

Another day mostly indoors, another walk in the park with Lola. Judging short stories for a wee competition I have been asked to judge, I note that in one of them the main character, a bored office worker, muses about an elderly co-worker and decides that the other man's life must be even more boring because it consists (so he surmises) of largely walking the dog. To imagine that such routines denote boredom and/or a lack of adventure is of course part of the lightly carried, standard-issue baggage of youth. As we grow older we realise that most of the exciting, tearaway adventures and subversions are happening in our heads, even if these may occasionally join hands with actual adventures such as trekking into wildernesses, exploring strange cities, going on merry sexual safaris, etc.

Anyway, back to Booterstown (love that name). I don't recall having seen the swans there in ages. The sky's more familiar garment has reassembled itself, a lining of rainclouds, from off-white to deep, slaty grey.