There is a crack ...

Another day of dreary weather - but there was a moment, before most of my temporarily enlarged household was stirring, when the sky cracked to the south of Dunoon, letting a shaft of brilliance light up the sea, and the song began to play in my head ... *

And because the family went home today, I needed to remind myself of the light that gets in through the cracks. I hate the emptiness of the house, even at the same time as I rejoice at being able to type this on my desktop instead of peering at my phone because the study is no longer full of beds and sleeping granddaughters; I hate the increasing rapidity of time that means the girls have changed every time I see them.  But the crack in that particular gloom was that the second part of the morning was filled with discovery as Catriona and I worked on the first act of Macbeth in the study while Anna sang downstairs with her grandfather, as she's just auditioned successfully for a part in the school's Shrek production. We've never actually heard her sing, so it was a joy to discover that she has a sweetly mature head voice and a great sense of pitch - we had a wee sing together before lunch. And when I realised that Catriona really is that S4 pupil in the top English section with whom I can discuss dramatic irony ...

They left after lunch, taking me with them on the ferry as far as Greenock where I had an overdue appointment with my hairdresser. We said our goodbyes in an Aldi carpark and they were home just as I was heading back to the ferry on the bus two hours or so afterwards. By the time I got home, Himself had stripped the girls' beds and collapsed one of them (it takes two to manhandle the futon) as well as putting the towels on to wash. We resolutely completed the business of returning the spare duvets and pillows to the loft before settling down to curry (made by Himself - lotsa brownie points today).

But one final good point about our return to a relatively normal life: I'll have time now to catch up on the Blip journals I've not been reading for the past fortnight!

There is a crack, a crack in everything - that's how the light gets in.

*Do listen to the song if you don't know it - a big favourite of mine.