Monday 11th January. I am not a fan of those newspaper claims about the most depressing day of the year, but if I was, I think it is meant to be today. I mean, just when you things can't get grimmer, there are hungry children and the most obvious consequence of Brexit is that the UK Government can overturn a ban on Neonicotinoids. But remember, the opposite of despair is not hope, it is action. I have signed this, and I hope you will too. I count my blessings. This list always starts with a roof, running water, and the fact that Puppers is not dead. She has had a number of near misses, one of which involved her lying in bed and tucking into a malt loaf and having to have her stomach pumped. 

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Tuesday 12th January. I make a list of the flowers that I wish to grow this summer, and then I write a list of things that I miss about summer. The smell of dry earth. Plums. Cherries. Not having to cook every time I want to eat. Lighting the oven. Mowing the orchard. Bare feet. The hammock. Roses.

Wednesday 13th January. A damson tree was dug up from the orchard last year (it never thrived) and its place taken by a fire bowl and a long trestle table. I notice that the daffodils that were planted around the base of the tree have not registered the change of use and are springing up in a ragged circle underneath the chairs. I feel pathetically grateful at the sight of them. 

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Thursday 14th January. Seeds. Even after the frosts, there are seed heads with the potential for life. The white corncockle in the Belfast sink by the studio has been standing in grey spikes throughout the winter and they rattle very slightly every time I open and shut the door. I peel the casing back to reveal the perfect black seeds. I brush aside the sycamore leaves covering the soil and tip the seeds out. This is not the right time for doing any proper seed sowing, but this one gesture feels like recklessness.

Saturday 16th January. Liquorice all sorts skies. Streaks of pink and blues, and then black. A reckless glass of wine and I howled with rage at the new series of Grand Designs. Did you see the first episode? £4.5 million. Utterly obscene. And then the second one, heart breakingly heroic, and no money at all. 

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Sunday 17th January. My mother arrives to take her hour exercise with Hugo. She pauses at the end of the garden path and asks if we can smell the spring. I stop what I am doing and notice that the volume of birdsong is deafening. I notice a sprig of cow parsley in the hedge before we trudge home through the mud in the gloom. There is hope.