Spirit of Place

Hogmanay is , at least in part, a time for  thinking of things past.  

It has been a roller coaster year - some good, some bad.     And some good came from some bad, like the down of the referendum result which actually turned out to be an energiser and empower of the country and a spur to making a better future.

2015 will be , no matter what, very different.   For the first new year since 2007 I am not in office, though my job as the MSP for Argyll & Bute will be satisfying and challenging enough over the next twelve months, leading up as it does to the election of 2016.  

This caught my eye this afternoon as I was preparing for the evening,  during which we are having friends over for dinner.   It is a horse collar complete with blinkers and it hangs on the only original , uncovered, wall in our lounge which was the old byre of the farm.   

It is there because it once belonged to a horse that lived in the byre and a neighbour, who had it, brought it back as a present because he thought it would be more fitting hanging here.

It has something of a spirit of place to it , given that the house in which we live was occupied by the farmer who worked the place until the mid 1970s. 

Hogmanays in this house even as recently as that would have been very different, though the anticipation of a New Year and new beginnings was no doubt  much the same.