Trees

It's been a long old day and we've been working very hard. It's the first day back for everyone this year, so all sorts of people are coming out of the woodwork answering emails which were sent way before Christmas.

Nathan has had a recent spate of very moving emails from people who have seen either the wedding or his knitting pod casts. Many of them come from mothers of gay people in America and they're usually fairly gushing. They thank him for being open about his sexuality and then tell him some awful story about how their son or daughter was persecuted by religious intolerance. They're always fairly painful reading, but I feel it's so important that these messages are being sent. The women who send them always tell Nathan that they themselves have had a big turn around in the way they feel about their children's sexuality and that Nathan, for them, merely reinforces the fact that it's okay, in fact, perhaps even good to be gay.

I have also received a whole slew of messages recently from people who have seen the wedding. I don't know how they're still seeing it. I don't think it's been repeated, but it is the gift which keeps on giving.

We went out to buy breakfast cereal this evening and found the streets littered with discarded Christmas trees. It's such a horrifying sight. The trees still look pretty healthy and beautiful and I find it awful to think about how long they'll have been growing proudly in the wild, sucking in carbon dioxide, only to be chopped down and strangled by gaudy tinsel for twenty days before being left to rot on a landfill site. There's something really wrong with that! I guess, in this country at least, they're sustainably farmed, and creating livelihoods for those who grow and farm them. And the likelihood is that most fake trees come from sweat shops in China. Ooh, it's a proper dilemma!

I had osteopathy today and got really tearful when the osteopath started a discussion about my anxiety levels. He cracked my back like some kind of crude percussion instrument and I suddenly felt all floppy. I've been given a stress-busting breathing exercise which they apparently use in the marines. My osteopath drew a helpful little illustration on a post-it note to help me to remember what to do. As I left the building he came running after me. I'd left it in the treatment room. Along with my wallet...

Hopeless.