My week on the Isle of Oleron: great weather, blue skies, sea breezes keeping the temperatures to loveably warm. The aromatic smells of mediterranean vegetation competing with brine and sea weed from the coast. Long trips around the island on rented bikes, swimming in the sea, eating fresh foods in the garden.

It’s still possible to be sad there, but it’s much harder to sustain for any lenght of time. Lots of light is good for the soul (even with factor 50 sun block twice a day).

The Age of the Guitar Builder is over for me. Seven years of perpetual storm ended up in us both concluding that we might be happier apart. To our credit, the ending was very civilized – no cheating, no entangled property, no children. Almost as if we knew deep down that it would come to this.

I expected to fall apart, but in fact i’m mostly stunned. There’s a whole area of my brain that needs reconfigured: the part wondering what he would like for dinner, worrying about him or asking him where i’d left my keys.

On the bright side, now nobody will complain if i install FreeBSD on a spare computer, if i hoard old pieces of hardware, or if i prepare dishes containing olives, anchovies, chicories, rabbit, corn, sweet and savoury combinations. See ? there’s always a bright side to everything.