Devenish

Yesterday's view down the hill As I write this piece, with the wind tearing strips off the trees around the house, a terrific shaking and howling on the balcony outside, visibility down to the other side of the glass, and the realization that all of the children's books that were sitting on the window-sill are now just that bit softer and wrinklier than they were yesterday, I know that Spring is over as suddenly as she came —at least on Rokko mountain—and has been superceded by a prolonged storm with son et lumière atmospherics of the kind that would not be out of place in a Kirk Douglas disaster movie. The sakura scenes of the last post belong to another country, entirely.

Sakura at Kobe College I have been thinking a lot about love, recently. Not deliberately, nor intentionally, and certainly not to great effect. Instead, the thoughts extrude, cropping up unsolicited in more reasoned reflection, like Spring crocuses, or dandelions perhaps. It may be the season, which is not the cruellest month this year, but a welcome relief from so much snow on the mountain, and the huddling around the kotatsu in the mornings. Or it could be the discussion I heard on last week’s Start the Week , in which Andrew Marr’s interviewee was the author of a new book on the subject of other than romantic or erotic love—on varieties of agape . Or it might have been Julian asking me last week whether I loved him more than his older brother (How have I failed as a parent so far that he harbours such insecurity?). Most probably, these are all related phenomena, the warm breezes and chatter of the end of winter. I can’t express the sentiment better than Tom Waits, you should jus

Dear Mum Thank you for calling earlier this evening. I'm very sorry that the BBC news reports from Fukushima, combined with our presence in Japan, have caused you so much concern. Please don't think that I am dismissive of the risks when I try to put things in perspective. I am worried too, but then, where the children are concerned, I worry about everything! I only know that...

Sunday walk to Rokko Farm (3.5km, not a vending machine in sight!) Back late to the mountain after a first day's teaching, with Justin sleeping rather fitfully across the room, I lack the energy needed to complete the new piece I was intending to publish today. In its place, prompted perhaps by the news of yet more dramatic shaking around Fukushima—the anthropomorph in me wants to ask Poseidon whether he doesn't think those poor souls up North have suffered enough?—and by the countless moral quagmires of Lybia, Gaza, Yemen, Bahrain and Ivory Coast, I offer a piece originally served up in November 2008, which is mostly a vehicle for a Raph McTell cover. Music and literature will solve none of these problems, but they do provide perspective, and make things a little easier to bear: enjoy!

Carlsberg doesn't do babies—at least, not intentionally!—but if they did... Seriously, though, we are incredibly lucky that everything has turned out so well thus far. All our fears and apprehensions of the first weeks after the diagnosis have mostly faded away, as in almost every respect, Justin is a normal 5 month old baby: cooing, paying attention, feeding and sleeping well; as of the past couple of days, he has even managed to turn over (from stomach to back—we're still waiting for the other direction). To any new parents reading this, who have just received the news that their child is a Down Syndrome baby, I hope this picture offers some comfort that things can turn out for the best (very probably!)

So, we’re all back in Japan now. (The linguistically minded will notice this is signalled by the comma after so , (,) my nod at an unfortunate habit of many Japanese writer of English [ sic ]). And I’ve survived two long-distance flights as sole guardian of three children (two under 5). I’m expected to say “survived”, because travelling long distances with small children is generally assumed to be a form of self-inflicted middle-class purgatory—or limbo perhaps, given the altitudes involved. In point of fact it was extremely easy and relatively painless, at least once we had managed to get […the eight pieces of luggage and sleeping baby from the rooftop parking (for car rental returns), through the drenching rain via a long line at Emirates check-in desk, through security with its infant-formula tasting sessions, past the near interminable maze of duty free, champagne bars, and supercar lottery concessions… ] to the departure gate. All without the benefit of hand-luggage trolleys or b