Life. Prrr. Grrr. Prrr.

It's been a while. Nearly three months in fact. Which probably merits a smidgeon of explanation. It's just life. Some very good things have happened to me, mostly involving slobbing out with a particularly wonderful-frustating-incredible-annoying individual, and one of the memories I will hold forever in my heart is simply being together on a sunny afternoon in Paris, watching the lime leaves tumble down as the ugliest boats in the world pootled by. And some very bad things have happened too, mostly involving individuals who to survive in one arena have felt the need to destroy the one person who stands in their way - er me, in case you haven't guessed. So between legal tiptoeing and my life being engulfed in one long firefight, between trying so hard to be normal throughout this time and the practical love of my loved ones, there hasn't been much room for anything else.

It's been a horrid time, but. And it's a big but. Indeed a hippo-sized 'but'. I have learnt so much and have been forced to think so much. To take risks, to reach out, to consider the less-thinkable, to go places that I would maybe not dare from within my comfortable suburbanizing life (it's my verb, I can do what I want with it. Ed). And I've found the courage to face the loss of everything material in my life and realise that it signifies - well, quite a lot, but by no means everything. And I've made friends again with my past self, the S that would stand up and fight for her right to be, that considered injustice and hazard and risk then waded on in anyway because making just one little bit of the world (and occasionally surprisingly some quite big bits of the world) better was more important than psychological safety. But don't mistake this for rashness. The trick to risk (as my very learned friend might say) is to understand the cost, understand the odds, estimate the returns and *then* decide what to do. And the beauty of liars and bullies is that the first have to remember more than one truth at a time (which is difficult and will almost always eventually fail and not in a small way), and the latter only survive if they have victims.

And speaking of which, something quite amazing happened today. I was bullied every day in my mid-teens. Twice a day every day going to and from school; more if they could catch me in-between. It got more than a little wearing; I can vaguely remember doing exams and O levels, and my first snog outside the maths classroom (oh, and some serious research into the linguistic origins of Dorset placenames and the note structures in Belshazzar's Feast and lots of other interest things), but most of my school memories are of ridicule, damage, fear and the feel of rosethorns in my back whilst a much older boy hit me from above. And behind all this was one girl, one person I'd stopped bullying a friend in primary school years earlier (girls are wierd: they immediately became friends and ignored me completely) and who'd seen an opportunity when I joined a new school on my own at 14. Oh, the amazing thing? She's contacted me. Which given I've changed my name and moved from place to place for most of my adult life must have taken a not insignificant amount of detective work. 10 years ago, M tried to apologise to my mother (who responded with the maternal version of 'sod off'), and maybe just maybe she's feeling the need to tidy her feelings now. I've sent a not-unfriendly note back; we'll see what develops from here. The curious thing personally is that, despite the effects of what she did, I feel no malice at all. Not even the psychologically-buried variety. Not a smidge. I feel sad for the child that I was and the child that she was (she'd moved school because she herself had been bullied - mother dated headmaster, 'nuff said), but there's no anger or pain there anymore. If she needs closure and I can give it, then I will. I suspect we could even, in the right circumstances, become friends. But the most curious thing is that I find myself now, 25 years later, in exactly the same situation. Except the thing at stake isn't my exam grades (I passed, but didn't get the 14 A*s that were predicted; that's still a big thing to employers even now) but my livelihood. And again I have a scared little girl with a powerful gang of friends shoving me into the rosebushes because it's easier than facing up to and living with her own self (which probably isn't as bad as she secretly fears). I still live with the effects of the first girl - the lost opportunities, the life I didn't have (not that that's so terrible; I had a pretty good alternative one instead, just one with less easy opportunities) - and I need to deal with the second before that too gets out of hand. After all, I'm not sure that I have 25 more years to spare on the effects of this one. That said (and like buts, there is always a 'that said'), a disaster is always a thinly-disguised opportunity for those who have the courage and the heart to take it. So onwards. And a little more blogging this time.