Belonged.

Our excitement this morning is provided by a gull that has found a small washed up flounder in a pocket of water on the beach. The bird cannot believe its good fortune. It chortles with delight.

The colours of the world around us are changing. The sea whiter. The clouds darker. Scotland is settling into winter.

Out here a few weeks ago the village fields were a sea of green and gold waiting to be harvested. Now the colour has gone and the land is drab and stubbly and waiting to be ploughed. As recompense winter sunrises paint the morning air with an Arctic intensity. 

After a hectic Saturday night the potato harvest is in. Now all that remains is for the cabbages to be cut and packaged. There's still no sign of the replacement part for the farmers state of the art cabbage picking machine but he hopes to start again on Thursday. Tomorrow his youngest son will be heading to Edinburgh with his elder brother to buy a suitably conservative suit for college 'functions'. " The costs are endless " observes his father.

A memorial stone makes us stop and pause. 'JDG belonged here' etched into a paving stone. 'Belonged' is a powerful word . There's something intense about the use of language. Born here, taught here, studied here, lived here, married here would be expected but 'belonged' carries a different, deeper signifier. We're left wondering who JDG was, what made them feel they had deep roots here, and what , if anything happened to them. The shortest epitaphs often carry the greatest weight.

A lyrical insight into Canada :https://rossboulton1.substack.com/p/my-fellow-americans-canadian-porch

Swords into ploughshares :https://thedebrief.org/the-classified-roots-of-nasas-nancy-grace-roman-space-telescope-how-a-spy-agencys-secret-satellite-became-a-space-observatory/

Safe flying :https://uxmag.com/articles/is-knowledge-management-worth-it

Shopping malls and ugliness:https://www.thenewatlantis.com/publications/you-probably-own-this-7-eleven

Oil:https://www.cfr.org/articles/crude-calculations-why-the-iran-war-hasnt-yet-caused-an-oil-shock