In 2008 on hearing the news that Obama had won four years ago, the first person I phoned, knowing she'd watched through the night, was my mum in the Highlands. This morning - just a few days after mum left us I yearned to do the same again. Of course I could not. I never can. Even so listening to BBC Radio 4 live - decency in an uncivil world - on my laptop as I get up to prepare for my lectures this morning, Obama's election victory is a small but heart-warming consolation.
I'm older and wiser, less purely jubilant, less illusioned - for a host of personal and public reasons. All the same this morning seems a little brighter than I expected - in part because my mind and heart has been so far away from the affairs of the world.
It's cold today. In about 45 minutes I shall have loaded up with my laptop and left in the grey weather to cycle to the university, along my favourite route beside the canals - the Soho Loop, the Birmingham Mainline, through Gas Street Basin to the Birmingham-Worcester towards Edgbaston. One of my colleagues main questions for those seeking accreditation says:
1. Is the importance of relationships adequately developed in the literature on scrutiny? Illustrate using two relationships between individuals involved in scrutiny, and how these relationships changed and developed over time. What general lessons can be learnt?I hope my lectures can assist my students to think about this, and I know i will learn from them.
My way to work |
I was wrong. Far from grey the morning sky was clear; sun pouring down the canal, now and then poised in a puddle on the tow path, dazzling. Blinding me.
Out again from the city cycling with the light behind I watched askance, beech and sycamore leaves passed swiftly over a tracery of slower moving trees.
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