Welcome to 2022 – I hope

At this time of year, every year since I started this blog way back in 2014, I’ve written a post to herald in the New Year whilst reflecting on the old. I did it in January 2020, little knowing what was round the corner and then did it again, somewhat more cautiously, in 2021.

 

It turns out that 2021 was a rum old year for many people, myself included, and it ended up with me doing a stint in hospital (not COVID, but not good). My latest novel, Elderlight, was published while I was still languishing in a hospital bed and, needless to say, photographic opportunities were somewhat limited whilst linked to a beeping hospital monitor. My last post for this blog was 9^th October 2021. It feels like a long time ago. 

 

I have no idea what 2022 will bring in general or photographically in particular, and I’m not about to guess. I'm an older, wiser and certainly more subdued me. At the moment I’m still recovering and not likely to be out and about taking photos for some time to come, which saddens me (and my impatient walking buddy).

 

I’ll leave you with a phone photo which sums up much of 2021. It’s not an especially good photo, but it is topical and, I think, sums up the activities of many of us in the UK towards the latter half of 2021. I hope to post more picturesque photographs later in the year.

Waving Goodbye to 2020 – Smiling Nervously at 2021

January 2020

  At this time of year, every year since I started this blog way back in 2014, I’ve written a post to herald in the New Year whilst reflecting on the old. I did it last year, little knowing what was round the corner:
 
  “As for 2020...? I have no idea. I have a new novel coming out within the next month, so I'm guessing there's going to be cover shots for Old Light and I'm hoping there will be photos and words on and off throughout the next twelve months, but I have no plans. I'm just going to go with the flow, wherever it takes me.”
 
  I really had no idea where the flow was going to take me, or the rest of the world.

February 2020

I began optimistically across January and February with a gradual photographic cover reveal for the new novel. Old Light was published on 29^th February 2020 and then came March and COVID 19 and the first UK lockdown (By the way, a word of advice – don’t launch a new novel just before a pandemic: it plays havoc with your book sales). 

March 2020

  I resolved to go for daily walks and keep a daily, written diary. It therefore seemed logical that the “daily constitutionals should have a diary of their own.” I used the blog to attempt to capture a photographic essence of my daily strolls out and about. I naively thought these daily posts would be for a month or two at the most and that come summer the virus would fade away, as the flu always did. Wrong. So very wrong. I was and am grateful, however, to be able to walk so often. The wonderful countryside around me has kept me grounded and motivated during a difficult year.
 

June 2020

I finally concluded the daily photographic posts at sunrise on 20^th June, the longest day of the year, and then moved to monthly posts. In practice these became two or three times a month posts – my desire to only upload photographic masterpieces giving way to the feeling that I needed to document these strange pandemic days and the evolving seasons in my small corner of Cambridgeshire.  

 

December 2020

It’s now 2021 and I’m still posting images from my walks two or three times a month and I’ve decided that I shall continue to do so until the middle of March this year. By then I shall have captured an entire year of photos of my walks and you will be able, if you wish, to view my local surroundings through all the seasons, weathers and times of the day (mostly afternoon, though. I’m really not a morning person, despite getting up to see sunrise on 20^th June.)

 

What am I going to do after the middle of March? I absolutely have no idea, photographically speaking or otherwise. The publication date for Elderlight, the third novel in my Witchlight series, has disappeared into the mists of the pandemic, along with any plans I may have had for 2021. If nothing else, 2020 has taught me to expect the unexpected and so, with my heart in my hands, I am making no plans for 2021. We shall see what we shall see, shan’t we?

April 2020

 I cannot, however, end this post without an image or two of my walking buddy. He hasn't accompanied me on all my walks, he is a cat, after all, but he has been there for many of them and waited patiently while I have photographed things (including, cat forbid, dogs!) He has been an understanding and loyal companion.

                                     

November 2020