andrew mitchell

Being back on Ward 45 last week triggered something deep and familiar. The corridors were exactly as I remembered; long, softly lit, smelling faintly of sanitiser and quiet worry. These are the same corridors I paced while waiting to be allowed into Critical Care, the same ones Emma slowly navigated after her life-saving, life-changing surgery.

There’s a strange stillness to hospitals; shadowless light, visitors exchanging furtive glances, everyone wishing for a return to a normal life. It feels a world away from the bright-eyed optimism of only a few weeks ago, when we wandered Bergamo’s narrow streets bathed in a golden autumn sun, full of relief, hope and normality.

When we returned home, a letter was waiting. An appointment with Emma’s oncologist. The holiday stopped abruptly, replaced by that familiar, anxious current. 

Smash cut to a small side room where he told us the scan had detected two enlarged lymph nodes in Emma’s groin. Our hearts sank. It could be nothing;  her lymphatic system still finding its rhythm, still responding to all the trauma of her surgery. Or it could be something else. A biopsy of both nodes is the only way to know. And that is happening as I type this post. 

Six months after her operation, three months after being told she was all clear, we find ourselves, once again, floating in that strange, slow tide of uncertainty. The waiting is its own kind of trial; a limbo between knowing and not, where every imagined outcome flickers like shadows on a wall.

Plato’s allegory of the cave keeps coming to mind. In his story, prisoners mistake the shadows for reality, never realising there’s a world of light beyond the walls. Fear works like that, casting imaginary shapes, worst-case scenarios, hypothetical futures, and we sit transfixed, mistaking them for truth. Step outside, though, and the light changes everything.

So I do what I always do: try to keep us both in the light. I tell Emma (and myself) that worrying about what’s to come won’t change what’s already in motion. The present moment is what we have. 

Lately, I’ve been guided by Henry Shukman’s The Way app,  short meditations that remind me to stay present, to sit with fear rather than run from it. Zen teaches that peace isn’t found by pushing thoughts away but by letting them pass like weather across a wide sky. The practice doesn’t erase worry, but it softens its hold. It’s like sitting beside the bin fire instead of inside it. 

For now, we wait. I’m deeply grateful that the system works,  that the surveillinace scans catch what our eyes can’t, that biopsies can be arranged within days. And yet, beneath the gratitude, there’s still that familiar fear. Whatever the results, whatever comes next, we’ll meet it as we always have; choosing hope over shadow.

For a while, Emma and I have been strictly cabin-baggage travellers, skipping the check-in desk and keeping our bags with us at all times. Of course, that meant packing light. We even managed our last trip to Japan with just two small bags in the overhead bins. With a bit of effort, we could have launched one of those incredibly smug YouTube channels teaching people how to optimise their luggage, as if it’s hard. But all of that changed once disability entered the picture.

Disabled passengers have it rough when it comes to travel. The things they need to simply live a normal life have to be prioritised, while the “nice-to-haves”, like holiday clothes and accessories people rush out to buy, fall by the wayside. There’s no night-before packing here. Disabled travellers have to get their shit together weeks in advance. Right now, we’re already battling a headache trying to source stoma supplies, thanks to the ridiculously convoluted way they have to be ordered.

Thankfully, some help does exist. Airlines offer Special Assistance Services for disabled passengers, which can include priority boarding and permission to bring an extra bag of essential medical supplies. If you remember “CushionGate” from earlier this year, you’ll know Emma requires her very specific (and very spenny) Valley Cushion for post-operative sitting. That had to be pre-approved by Ryanair for our trip. just as it has to be approved for every gig or show we attend.

As an Ostomate, Emma needs ready access to stoma bags, scissors, dry wipes, adhesive remover spray and cleaning products. There's even been a huge chew on getting her supplies in time. Instead of sending out her monthly supplies a whole week early, as that would require ANOTHER PRESCRIPTION, they actually suggested we call 101 to request some additional supplies. Lads, there's 200,000 people with a stoma! It really shouldn't be this hard.

On top of that, her surgery recovery requires an entire kit of medical supplies: dressings, sterile water, silver-infused gauze, sterile gloves, surgical tape, antibacterial hand sanitizer, incontinence pads, and spare clothes in case of leaks.

Then there’s the super-specialist travel insurance. That means submitting every last detail of Emma’s treatments, dates, medications, and surgical notes. We need prescription documents for her medication; Oral Morphine, Gabapentin, anti-sickness meds, anti-diarrhoeals, plus an itemised doctor’s letter for each one. Add to that a stamped letter explaining her hidden disability and a paper trail for every single thing we carry.

And that’s before we even mention the admin ball-ache of medical cannabis oil. For this, we needed another signed travel letter from her clinic, another prescription, and written approval from the Italian Consulate, despite cannabis already being decriminalised there. I’m nervous about leaving it behind, because medical cannabis has been a complete game-changer for Emma’s pain, healing, anxiety and sleep. If you know someone going through a cancer journey, I urge you to look into it. Drop me a line, I'll extol the virtues of it all day long.

All of this is before we even start the “normal” holiday packing. Just with far less space. It’s a lot. It’s draining. It’s stressful. Have we thought of everything? Do we have enough supplies? Do we have all the emergency numbers?

This is all for a three day trip that is giving heavy summiting Everest vibes. To quote Jack Donaghy: “I need a vacation, from this vacation.”

Still, if we make it through with everything intact, and aren't grilled by airport staff, we’ll be sharing some snaps of spitzes, town squares and delicious food. Because after the last sixteen months, Emma more than deserves for this little trip to be absolutely lush.

Somehow I turned 45 today; easily the oldest I've ever been.

Ages ago, in the pre Covid days, I had designs on a birthday party. In fact, a multi-location party. The 23rd September was to be spent in Manchester, celebrating my great friend Andy's 50th, and the next day we'd hightail it back to Newcastle for my 40th. The pandemic put pay to that notion.

To be honest, I was never truly sold on the idea. Bringing everyone I know together for a knees-up sounds great in principle, but it also sounds like a uneasy emotional rollercoaster that I'd never be able to really prepare for. I find parties hard; lovely but hard. I've never been able to put my finger on it. I really need to steel my resolve to go them. Thankfully sweet lady alcohol is usually on hand to help dial down the swirling sense of anxiety I have just thinking about them.

On Friday I was finally, after a lot of form filling and interviews, diagnosed with Inattentive ADHD. With the added bonus of suspected Autism to boot. I've yet to really process any of this but the whole parties give me the ick now makes a lot more sense. I long held the belief that my Cyclothymia riddled brain was holding hands with a mysterious other force; one of compulsion, racing thoughts and zero focus.

I remember being 13, when I first got glasses, seeing the world in crystal clear clarity for the first time. It was remarkable. The leaves on trees, the beauty of flowers, the detail in everything. Sadly it's not one of the those cute Reddit videos when babies get given plastic glasses for the first time but you get the picture. Receiving an ADHD diagnosis is like having blinkers taken off. You're able to look back over your entire life and realise there IS a reason for your actions and behaviours over the years. I wasn't just the weird kid I was convinced I was; there was something else at play.

In my diagnostic interview with my clinic psychologist I described my life as if being cast in a TV show role that I never wanted. Being fairly diligent, I've learned my lines, been through blocking and know my marks, I just don't want to be there, knowing all too well I’ve been hopelessly misscast. For the most part, my interactions with the real world sees me going through the motions. I know how to make people laugh, I'm able to empathise, to offer help and support but, to me anyway, a lot of things feels forced and performative. The problem is, I've done this for so very long as a way of keeping a spotlight off myself I don't actually know how I really behave in social settings. Or how to receive praise. Wew, that is something that turns my stomach.

Years ago, I had the addmittedly annoying habit of clicking my pen while concentrating on anything at work. The percussive, repetitive motion soothed me, it let me concentrate on reports and papers while simulatanously driving my colleagues up the wall. A co-worker pointed it out, imploring me to stop, which I immediately did, terribly ashamed of causing others distress. Once it was pointed out, I added it to the big mental list I carry around with me of things that I can't do because they annoy other people and it’s a big ol' list believe you me.

I wasn't even aware until a few months ago that this, and similar behaviours, are known as 'stimming;' a type of self soothing that can improve mood, focus, information processing, decision making and motivation while reducing sensory sensitivity and anxiety levels. The same goes for my fidgeting and twitching. I'm so conscious of it, after another colleague brought it up years and years ago, that I purposely avoid doing it where I can which can be really hard.

Now, I need to reapply some of these things to help make my daily life less of a daily bin fire. This is why I treated myself, as a birthday present from me to me, to a mechanical keyboard. My earliest computer memories are of the sumptuous sounds and feels of a weighted, clicky keyboard. This is quite possibly the only type of ASMR I could vibe with; the rest of it needs to get immediately into the bin. But, as someone who its incapable of brevity, writing this post today has been a delight; a soothing, stimulating delight. It's also served to stop me from applying to for the Access to Work funding I need for ADHD coaching, because that seems a little tragic to be applying for on my birthday, maybes tomorrow instead.

I'm sure there'll be more ADHD content coming just as soon as my brain instructs me to research the shit out of it and fathom out what I do now.

The Great North Run is something else in terms of mass participation events. The feeling in the north east on race day is crackers; an underlying current of excitement runs through the entire region. Public transport becomes a nightmare, pubs jack up their prices, but it’s all part of the occasion. It's a remarkable undertaking and having the world's largest half marathon pretty much on our doorstep is just wonderful.

When Emma started treatment for Bowel Cancer we spent nearly every minute at home. Chemotherapy followed by Radiotherapy sapped her of health and energy; it was tough, really tough. I decided running might help me keep it together and burn off some mental anguish so started going out at 5am before Emma woke up. Legging it around a deserted Costco, in the dead of winter, attempting not to set my neck on black ice was exactly zero fun.

With metalwork holding my left hip together training was a hell of a lot harder than I remembered it being. I've never been a running fan, despite the obvious health benefits. My training continued throughout 2025 following the tried and tested walk, run, swear, repeat technique. It did get easier but also more painful.

The hard truth is, if I push it, it absolutely knacks. I've had pain every day since my hip op, regardless of how much mobility work I do. It makes life a bit shit and this is probably why my surgeon told me not to run again.

But running has undoubtedly helped my mental health a great deal over the last year. I know it's also helped all of the amazing Team Booze members as well. And, in signing up for the Great North Run, we've received an amazing amount of donations from friends and family, near and far. Your kindness and generosity has helped us collectively raise over £6100 for MacMillan Cancer Support, a charity that helped us a huge amount throughout Emma's cancer journey.

I also had the absolute pleasure of running with my sister in law. Training with Sarah over the last few months has slowed my pace to a comfortable level and brought some of the joy that I've read about in running articles. She is, hand on heart, my second favourite person in the world; a beautiful soul who made the worst year ever much more bearable.

I'm considerably slower post surgery, but being able to complete the course with Sarah, sans headphones, taking in the claps and cheers was incredible, and seeing folks with Team Booze placards was just the best.

It was in no way my best time, but the best time was had. I'm so proud of what we have achieved. Turning a torrid time into taking positive action is important, it has power. And next year some of us will do it again and despite the rope biting pain in my hip two thirds of the way around, I'll be one them.

Thank you to each and every person who donated to this vital cause. You're all heroes. Just like every other runner out on the course on Sunday. Whether PB or last to finish, the physical and mental effort of the GNR is not to be sniffed at. But my oh my, that first pint of Stones after it. Bloody hell!

Let's just ignore the medal design balls up eh?

Halfway through my month without a smartphone, I’ve noticed one thing above all else: noticing itself. The small details that return to you when your gaze is no longer swallowed by that black pool of narcissism we stare into for far too many hours each day.

Most of my working week is spent at a small Ikea desk in our spare room, tapping away at websites and developing projects. To my right is a modest window overlooking the yard and back lane. Two rows of red-brick terraces face each other, divided by a strip of tarmac. Cables hang like tangled vines, rusted satellite dishes tilt dutifully toward the sky. It’s hardly bucolic, but it’s alive.

Lately, I’ve been drawn to this window more than I have in years. Instead of wasting free moments in the endless scroll, I find myself gazing at the comings and goings of my immediate community. I’m beginning to understand why it’s such an integral part of Sidney’s day. That boy can turn watching into an art form.

From here, I’ve seen a father teach his son to ride his first bike, shouting encouragement while his trousers slipped ever further south. I’ve watched a neighbour scatter chicken scraps for a band of cats who wait patiently by her back gate, punctual as clockwork. Those same cats patrol the lane like detectives, sniffing tyres, nibbling weeds, swiping at butterflies before collapsing in a patch of sun.

Every few hours a flock of starlings gathers on the rooftops, their noisy chatter carrying through the lane as they devour bread tossed onto a flat roof. Lazy seagulls balance on chimney pots, idling away their hours, watching as I do.

This week, a Goldcrest appeared, a bird I’d never seen in Dunston, darting along the narrow path while an older man swept his step with a kind of devotion I thought belonged to the Beamish.

An L-plate motorcyclist emerges daily, wheeling his bike between two parked cars before sputtering off on a reluctant 125cc. Delivery drivers thrash the tits off their vans down the back lane, desperate to hit the next drop. Parents push bairns in buggies. Dog walkers do their loops. The hours fill with these small stories.

Even the clouds have become companions, after I stumbled across a cloud-watching site that drew my gaze skyward. An endless procession, shape-shifting and drifting quietly by.

If this is boredom, the very thing we’ve tried to cure with those pay-monthly slave masters that ping, buzz, and vibrate for our attention, then I’ll take it. I’m glad to have switched.

It’s been three years since I broke my hip. Not a hairline fracture, not a sprain; proper shattered. Three breaks in the left femoral neck, which required a dynamic hip screw and months of physical rehabilitation. The sort of injury that alters the way you move through the world. I remember being sat in our spare room, strung out of my mind on top shelf painkillers, unable to do much.

At the time of my calamitous fall, I was told I shouldn’t run again. Or ride a bike. My hip was repaired, but fragile, thanks to a diagnosis of osteopenia, a condition where your bones begin to thin. As 40 hit, I started to, quite literally, drop to bits. It was the kind of warning that you don’t ignore.

So I stopped running and cycling dead. And, for a couple of years, that was that.

Running had once been a small but steady part of my weekly routine. Always done through gritted teeth; I knew it was good for me despite having never once felt the runner's high I've heard so much about. I'd twice before completed the Great North Run, raising money for Parkinson’s UK, a cause close to home. Emma’s dad, Dave, lives with Parkinson’s, so the GNR had always been about more than finishing times. It was about whacking hundreds in the fundraising tin. It was a way of turning helplessness into something active.

Still, I accepted my consultant's verdict, no more running. I focused on recovery. Strengthened the hip joint slowly with multiple rounds of daily exercises. Every day, teaching my body how to trust itself again, and not collapse in a heap. BTW looking for a quick mobility fix? Stand on one leg while brushing your teeth and swap legs halfway through, it’s a gamechanger.

But then came Emma’s diagnosis. Suddenly, our lives were overtaken by new routines; hospital appointments, consultations, endless scans. And in that shitty sea of uncertainty, Macmillan Cancer Support became a lighthouse.

They were more than a resource. They were clarity and calm. Along with Bowel Cancer UK's incredible forum, Macmillan’s website was the only one we truly trusted. Free from the noise and misinformation that seems to echo around a diagnosis like this. I'm looking at you Robbie, Emma's sisters downstairs neighbour and your 'Turbo Cancer' bullshit.

Beyond their online outreach, their physical presence within NHS wards, and dovetailed integration into the cancer care system, was invaluable. They were woven into the fabric of Emma’s treatment, and, as a result, our lives.

So when watching the 2024 GNR on the telly last year, eyes filled with tears in awe of the everyday athletes, how could I not sign up for another go?! Even though, physically, I still probably shouldn’t be running. But let's not dwell on that one eh?!

Starting Over

I slowly began running again in Autumn last year, using a version of the trusted Couch to 5K as my restart. Soon after, I signed up to the Runna app to structure a plan, complete with a body weight programme, to build up key muscles to help with the discomfort. My hip was NOT happy, flaring up more than once, groaning and aching at what I was putting it through. My gait had changed, as had my speed. Mr. Tumia, my consultant, had warned me, this isn’t a great idea. But I had to try.

Running had always been solitary for me. Headphones in, podcasts on, eyes fixed forward, one foot in front of the other, all through sensationally laboured breathing. But then in April, everything stopped. Emma went into surgery, and I became her full-time carer. Training fell to the wayside, despite it being somewhat of a release, a way out of the house at 5am before she woke up. However, when someone you love is recovering from a giant operation, the rhythm of your life changes entirely.

Alongside the change in routine came a shift in my mental health. I live with cyclothymia, a mood disorder on the bipolar spectrum. After spending much of the past year in a state of manic energy; cooking, cleaning, crying, caring; the pendulum, as it always does, swung back, dropping me into a deep depressive phase. The kind that makes even small things feel enormous. The kind that makes getting out for a run feel impossible.

My bodyweight exercises fell away. The consistency I'd built crumbled. But I kept the race in mind. Friends and family had joined in and Team Booze, the name given to our first GNR dalliance a decade ago was reborn. We were back under starters orders. There was zero chance of me not making the start line in September.

A New Kind of Running

On the longest day of the year, I joined Sarah, Emma’s sister, at a Macmillan fundraiser at Fausto Coffee in Roker. We met at the ungodly hour of 3.30am to hightail it to Sunderland, where we ran a few gentle miles along the beach with fifty or sixty others. Afterwards, we toasted the dawn with mimosas and an amazing picky breakfast. It was the first time I’d ever run with someone else. and you know what, it felt great!

The simplicity of it. The shared pace and support. So, since then, Sarah and I have been running together. Not all the time, but at least once a week. We’ve found a rhythm. My pace has slowed slightly. Hers has picked up. Benjamin Button style, we’ve met somewhere in the middle, where conversation is easy(ish) and the need for headphones and specific BPMs fades away. .

For me, it has completely changed the nature of the run. It's no longer about personal bests, it’s about being present. Being together. Emma and I lived with Sarah for several months when she was diagnosed and our house was being fettled. Our coming together to run 13.1 miles felt right.

So Race Day is looming again, and while a part of me still would love to break the two-hour mark, having missed it by 30 seconds last time when my legs worked properly. But that’s absolutely not the priority anymore.

This time, I want to take it in. The atmosphere, the energy, the stories of other runners, each with their own personal quest in front of them. My previous two efforts on the course were blinkered by that ridiculous need to achieve.

After both mine and Emma’s surgeries, I’ve learned not to take movement for granted. Whether it’s walking after injury or simply managing to get out of the house when depression tries to anchor you down. This run isn’t about achievement. It’s about acknowledgement. About marking the end of a year of treatment and fear, twelve months of resilience and support. I’ll be a clip at the end.

Support Us

Sarah, in the most generous act, has even chosen to include fundraising at her 40th birthday party later this month. There’ll be a big raffle, full of wonderful donations from lovely people, with all the proceeds going to Macmillan. It’s a selfless act, folding support for others into a day that should really be all about her. But that’s who Sarah is. I couldn’t be more proud to be running with her.

If you’re able to support us, we’d be incredibly grateful. Every donation helps Macmillan continue to provide information, guidance, and face to face support for people facing the hardest chapters of their lives. We’re proud to run for them and hopeful for a future where they’re no longer needed.

But until then, we’ll keep going.

Pop a pound in the hat here – https://www.justgiving.com/team/teambooze

Starting August 1st, this Friday, I’ll be switching off my smartphone for an entire month. No mobile social media. No phone camera. No banking apps. No browser. It will stay at home, out of sight.

Instead, I’ll be carrying a dumbphone for calls and texts only, the Punkt. MP02, that I was sent to take part in their annual Digital Balance Challenge. Throughout the month I’ll capture moments with a point-and-shoot camera, jot down my thoughts in a paper notebook, and read from a stack of paperbacks I’ve been meaning to get to for far too long. Not the one's I ruin daily for Paperblack Writer I hasten to add.

A few months ago I picked up £20 MP3 player for offline music while running. The player, a tiny Mechen H1 Pro, equivalent in size and shape to deck of playing cards, runs a hugely outdated version of Android but is still able to handle albums downloaded from Tidal.

I’ve had music in my pocket since my first Walkman at age seven or eight. Progressing through a series of tape and CD players, minidiscs, iPods and phones. However, in keeping with the spirit of the month, I've only loaded up actual albums. No playlists or algorithmically generated radio stations. I also have my wonderful XHDATA radio for the allotment. Do I intend to turn the greenhouse into a metal framed, short wave antenna booster? You better believe I do!

The erosion of boredom

In recent years, I’ve noticed how little time I spend being bored. Every moment of nowt; whether waiting for a bus, the walk between the shops and home, lying in bed; all have become an opportunity to check something, to cehck anything. I’ve eliminated boredom from my life almost completely. But that surely comes at a cost.

Psychologist and neuroscientist Bruce Hood, in his 2024 book, The Science of Happiness, who was recently interviewed on the excellent 10% Happier podcast, explains that social media and smartphones hijack the brain’s reward system. The constant feed of novelty; likes, reels, news, endless memes, all keep us hooked, but rob us of focus and deep satisfaction.

“We are cultivating habits of mind that reward distraction,” Hood writes,“and eroding the mental space where imagination, creativity and problem-solving happen.”

Boredom is not a flaw in the human system, it’s a feature. As a child, I filled my time with bike rides, running around woods or waiting impatiently for my favourite TV shows to come on. It's hardly like I was luddite child. After being bored of playing my computer games on my Spectrum +2, I got a book out of the library to learn how to code. And I learned by typing out pages and pages of BASIC, for hours on end.

Living less efficiently

The month is also about breaking habits, like tapping my phone to pay. I’ve been using banking apps, and mobile payment platforms for so long that I simply don't use cash, ever.

This August, I’ll go back to carrying coins and notes where possible. A minor friction, but one that reminds me I’m actually spending something real, something earned. The disconnect between my wages and ordering things online is genuinely terrifying. Things just arrive magically don't they?

So for one month;

• I'll still take photos, but I'll not edit or share them instantly.
• I'll still listen to music, but not on shuffle and I only what I specifically want to hear. Unless on the radio, I get zero say in that one.
• I’ll still capture thoughts, but with pen and paper.

Life will be slower, quieter and undeniably messier.

A pause, not a renunciation

I’m not quitting smartphones forever; my current job is in digital innovation after all. This isn’t a performance or a purity test. It’s a reset, kicked finally into gear by the Digital Challenge.

Like many of us, I often feel totally fragmented; information rich but insight poor. I'm even turning my back on podcasts for the summer. I was there when audioblogs, courtesy of the name from Ben Hammersley, became podcasts. Remember when the only wway to find and suscribe to shows was via RSS feed on the PodcastAlley website? I certainly do. I was even broadcasting them to my car radio on FM as, at the time, bluetooth wasn’t a thing. And amazingly, it was illegal to do so.

I’ve been feeling the need for boredom for some time;  for space, for a mind less tethered to the all deciding algorithm.

As Neil Postman warned in Amusing Ourselves to Death, long before smartphones,

“People will come to adore the technologies that undo their capacities to think.”

That undoing happens quietly, notification by notification, swipe by swipe, until the ability to simply sit still, look, and wonder feels like a lost art. I don't even know if I have it in myself to reclaim the attention I’ve so obviously lost along the way but I'm excited to find out. Excited to let things slow down and see what surfaces in the silence.

I’ll report back in September. Maybes.

Our allotment sits just over 200 metres from home. It;s hard to imagine a more conveniently placed patch of earth. A cluster of around fourteen plots lies tucked behind a row of houses on our street. For years, we didn’t even know they were there. A locked gate world of fruit, veg and greenhouses; a sprouting shanty town if you like, kept safe from rogue elements by tall metal fences.

In our eighteen years of living in Dunston, I’d never once stepped inside, until our cat Sidney went missing last year, during Emma’s chemotherapy.

That first visit was anxious: cat box and apacket of Dreamies in hand, searching for a feline needle in an overgrown haystack. At the time, many of the plots had been abandoned. Trees, hedgerows, and brambles ran riot. Old bathtubs, shattered glass, and the relics of half-finished projects, filled the space. The rent was so low that many tenant simply left their plots to wilderness while continuing to pay, keeping the site frozen in disrepair.

I spent a week scouring the village, walking over 70 miles, distributing posters, and searching by torchlight. At last, someone spotted Sid, retreating within the fenced-off allotments. With help from the Cat Protection League and one of their humane traps, I was able to bringhim home. After seven days of heavy rain, his white coat was pristine. He’d clearly found shelter in one of the old sheds. The allotment had been his refuge. And in many ways, it's become ours too.

Earlier this spring, the Council began clearing part of the site, hoping to revitalise it and welcome new growers. Miraculously, having only been on the waiting list for a year, we were offered a plot. The catch? It was in a super rough state, used for years as a dumping ground. A dense tangle of roots, branches, and nutrient-starved soil, all of which would become our probelm to sort. Despite Emma’s looming surgery, we jumped at the opportunity. We started sketching plans for what we might grow.

Before we received the key to the ancient padlock guarding the entrance, I was invited back to view a different space. A half plot once tended by Paul, the site’s former treasurer. At 78, Paul was in declining health and struggling to manage the full area. His offer came with warmth but also caution. Many newcomers, he said, arrive with energy but quickly abandon their plots.

I met him at 7am a few days after getting the key, sitting in one of his orderly sheds while he brewed tea on a Calor gas stove. Rain tapped the roof softly as we talked. He was kind, generous, and remarkably, someone I may have crossed paths with him years ago in my days as an Energy Officer in South Tyneside.

He’d worked the allotment for close to forty years. Handing over even half of it was no small thing. He's shared photos of the allotment was he first took over the plot and also of it in its productive pomp. I promised we’d pick up the reigns as best we could.

With the plot, came Paul's knowledge and care. The soil is rich and living, a legacy of his years spent watching, turning, growing. Paul text me often, always ready to lend advice or tools. He’s also preparing his “Nature Area’” for Emma/ a peaceful corner spot with a pond, bird feeders, and seating, somewhere to for her rest while I tackle the heavier tasks.

Back while Emma recovered from surgery, I spent two weeks, in between hospital visits, peeling back the fallow year. Cutting brambles, digging out stubborn roots, revealing the shape beneath. Now that Emma can visit, we’re restoring Paul’s greenhouse, laying new paths, and gently shaping the space into something that is both old and new.

I’d initially thought of the allotment as a little more than a garden. Now I see it differently. It’s a healing space; for Emma and for myself. I hope it to become a sanctuary where Emma can reconnect with nature’s rhythms, and where we both begin to rebuild.

We’ve kept much of what was already growing; rhubarb, raspberries, old fruit bushes. Our leeks and courgettes are settling in. The cabbages, well, you can't win everything.  Every micro harvest feels like a celebration. But more than the crops, it’s the process that matters.

The hours I spend there, pulling endless weeds, strimming grass, watching bees and butterflies dart among the blossoms, have all become hugely important. Time slows. It breathes. As Paul reminded me: the most productive thing you can do on an allotment is sit; sit and watch.

Back at home, time is measured in appointments, alerts, and scrolls, purchases, likes and shares. But here, it flows differently. Weeks pass when little appears to change. Yet underground, everything is shifting.

Reading Neil Postman recently has led me to discover Wendell Berry, a Kentucky farmer, poet, and activist, whose work speaks deeply to this slowness. In The Art of the Commonplace (2002), Berry writes:

“Slow down.

Pay attention.

Do good work.

Love your neighbours.

Love your place.

Stay in your place.

Settle for less, enjoy it more.”

Berry believes that caring for land is an act of moral attention, done as a rejection to the speed and abstraction of modern life. Tending the earth becomes a political act; not of protest, but of care. Gardening is not quaint; it's radical.

This slow type of growth isn’t always comforting. Often, after hours of graft, the plot looks unchanged. But that, I’ve learned, is the real lesson. It refuses instant gratification. It asks for trust, attention, and faith in the unseen.

Berry puts it simply in Standing by Words (1983):

“It may be that when we no longer know what to do, we have come to our real work, and that when we no longer know which way to go, we have begun our real journey.”

This slow journey is where something real begins to grow.

I’ve set up an album to whack in photos as the allotment changes, feel free to have a look.

Our Saturday was the kind of day you might easily overlook; some dumplings in the Grainger Market, a couple of pints in pubs, all sountracked by the endless lashing of rain. But for Emma and me, it marked something far bigger. Fourteen weeks after her surgery, fourteen weeks that have reshaped how we go about our days, Emma suggested, completely out of the blue, that we go into town. It wasn’t for a hospital appointment, a scans or a dressing changes. It was just: let’s go out, because we can.

We had gyoza at Dumpling and Bun, on one of the busy alleyways of the covered market. Eight, hand pleated parcels, the tang of vinegar, the umami of soy. Simple. No flourishes. The kind of food you try your damnedest to eat slowly, because it will be hoovered up too quickly otherwise. It felt amazing to sit together and enjoy something so simple.

We’d first eaten gyoza in an izakaya in Hiroshima, sitting shoulder-to-shoulder with strangers, late at night years ago. Crowded on a countertop, surrounded by jubilant Pride March participants, it felt like we were starting to sketch a blueprint for our future. Maybe it won’t be long before we're able to go back to Japan, it really does feel like anything might be possible.

Now, it absolutely pissed it down all day, but it didn't dampen our spirits one iota. Not after everything. Sitting with pint of Jarl in the Bacchus it came to me, we’d crossed the Rubicon. Wew.

Of course, there will be check-ups, scans, anxiety. But from this point, we move forward. Emma will be able to do more. Our world is opening up.

As I try to make sense of changed priorities and endless swirling thoughts, I’ve been reading Neil Postman’s book, Amusing Ourselves to Death, mainly as an antidote to my own digital malaise.

Despite using social media as a platform to chart Emma's illness, doom scrolling always followed each and every update I posted. Clicking the ads that were served to my feed with pinpoint precision.

This pretty remarkable work from 1985, makes it hard to ignore what we’ve lost by using these engagement fruit machines and, in turn, what we're doing to ourselves. Incredibly, this is a book written forty years before the algorhythmic ascendency. Postman writes about how our culture has shifted from a serious and considered mode of discourse to one shaped entirely by ephemerality. In the eighties it was the march of twenty four television that the author honed in on, but his words apply all too well in today’s digital hellssape.

Postman didn't fear that we would be destroyed by what we hate, like Orwell feared in 1984, but, instead, by what we 'love'. That we would drown ourselves in distraction. That we’d forget to pay attention to what really mattered most to us.

Perhaps it isn't a social media feed we need, but instead, perhaps, a social media field. Somewhere not to consume, but to plant, to grow.

That’s why this trip out mattered so much. The satiety of a delicious meal, the warm rain washing away the stains of last year, the feeling of Emma’s hand in mine. The old me would be one to the next thing by now, but I just can’t shift it.

I'm continuing to learn from her recovery; most importantly, to remove the unrequired. To pare back. To have simpler goals. To stop trying to fill single fucking moment with something, with anything. Instead, to let time stretch out. Recovery teaches you that intentionality is good, it's healing. You realise how rare and fragile it is to get to share time with someone you love and not be lost in our own skull sized kingdoms.

We’ve spent so long living from one hospital appointment to the next, that we had lost track of us. We’ve been ruled by the clock; for nursing visits, for timed medication, for pelvic floor exercises, all while being distracted by the screen. But Saturday reminded me that time can still dilate, it can stretch and soften, if we let it.

Four hours can feel like much more.

I’ve been wondering what my blackout poems are really trying to say. On the surface, they’re simple: a black marker, a paperback page, and the slow excavation of meaning.

But beneath that, something deeper is happening. I think they’re speaking to me—more than I’d realised.

Today’s poem read:

care about your future the walls of the office have you manipulated

I didn’t set out to write something that questioned my work life. Yet those are the words my eyes landed on. There’s a pattern emerging. Despite my choice of pages being completely random, from completely different books, what I choose, the phrases I circle, the words surviving erasure.

i was overwhelmed

by it all finally

i could hear

‘are you okay?’

and

i tried so hard

but slowly

i found myself

more and more alone

i am so sorry

And one that really hits.

it sounded like

the perfect distraction

and now

it was a pain in the ass

I started this a deliberate creative outlet; tactile but quick, deliberate but easy. It’s helped to regulate my thoughts, helped with the doomscroll. Sitting down with a page and searching for meaning brings a type of mindfulness I’ve struggled to find elsewhere.

And it’s not super performative. Unlike my Working Men’s Club project, where I was trying, several times a day, to conjure up a fictional world, a riduclous narrative arc, and semblance of social commentary, all at once. This feels far less full on.

After a year of creating only to explain Emma's illness, this is starting to bring me back. But these fragments, rinsed from someone else’s story, keep echoing my own thoughts and feelings. It’s as if my subconscious is curating the poems and leaving me breadcrumbs in ink.

After long stretches away from work over the past twelve months, caring for Emma through her illness and surgery, I’ve felt out of step with my role. What once felt creative now feels procedural. I know I'm not fulfilled, but seeing these words stark on the page, feels like someone, something else stepping in, and saying what I can’t.

Perhaps this erasure project isn’t just about removing, but revealing.

And what’s being revealed is a call for change.