Thursday 4th May

Is it the chilly weather or perhaps the realization that if this is Summer it doesn’t feel any different from Winter, but I cannot quite shake off these Summer Winter blues.   And everywhere I look; glum faces.  Maybe I need a holiday.  I know, I have only just returned from the Dordogne, but we hardly saw the sun on that trip at all.  Maybe I need a real exotic holiday in some tropical paradise, with a white sun-drenched beach, palm trees leaning out over the sea, on a lounger with a straw parasol and a tall cool glass of pina-colada or a mint julep on a small table beside me, a collection of glossy magazines and the latest bestseller grabbed in haste at the airport.

But I am afraid that that has never been me at all.  Firstly although I do love the warmth of the sun, being fair-skinned I do not tan well and consequently not only smother myself in the highest factor sun-screen I can find, but positively avoid sitting in the direct sunlight.   No, what I want is that gorgeous warm-but-not-too-hot English summer weather that I seem to remember from my childhood, those languid days laying on a blanket on the freshly mown lawn half in and half out of the shade of a large plane tree, reading Jane Eyre and with a glass of Corona Cherryade and a few Rich Tea biscuits for refreshment.  A simple enough pleasure one would have thought, but as I look out on another dreary overcast rain-threatened day it seems as far away as those memories.