Coming Home

Mrs Miniver Comes Home.

It was lovely, thought Mrs Miniver, 

nodding good-bye to the flower-woman 

and carrying her big sheaf of chrysanthemums down the street 

with a kind of ceremonious joy, as though it were a cornucopia; 

it was lovely, this settling down again, 

this tidying away of summer into its box, 

this taking up of the thread of one's life where the holidays 

(irrelevant interlude) had made one drop it.

Mrs Miniver by Jan Struther,

who was talking about October, but for me

the thread has always been taken up in

September.

It's the month for coming home.

It's the month for sharpening pencils,

cleaning paintboxes,

and new projects:

some small,

some large.

Here is the beginning of a small one.

Two small pieces of vintage linen

found in Hay on Wye

exactly the right size for a cushion cover,

possibly with a crocheted edge using a ball of

shimmery hand dyed ribbon 

if I can follow the instructions in my Ladybird book

Learning to Crochet.

The big project

is in a delicate and precarious state

and cannot be talked about yet

for fear of jinxing it.