I squindle with my specs. I do. the loud ones see me this, but not that, and the others, a bit smeary, show me that but not this. It’s a flipping palaver. They’re obviously both wrong. It isn’t me. It’s them. However, this visionary stoppulence thinks me. As vision alters, olding eyes and such, new aids are vital, for independence, and, of course, for vision. For which thank you to all those who see us, help us on our exciting journey on. When you know that you are in the evening of your life, you can become what you were as a young thing. I want my way. Don’t stop me. I remember it from youth, feel it now. Don’t tell me how to end this, or start this. Just don’t.

I am listening to an audio book about the past of my Celtic forbears. The clearances. The story is of the potato famine in West Cork, but it happened here too. Families starved into submission, turned or burned out of their homes and left desolute. Begging.

I n this surface life, when our children have no idea of their history, because what? It’s painful?

We need to teach. Eyes on it.