The parakeets are back. I saw them in the street last night and I laughed. One flew overhead and then the other and then I realised there was a cloud of them in the trees opposite the library like leaves. I walked laughing because they were back.

The thing about symbols is so obvious, they only mean something because you say they do but that's not the same thing as meaning nothing.

KD came round for Sunday dinner and to see the puppy. He gave me back my copy of Das Capital and I gave him back his zombie book. There were no fights at dinner about socialism between him and my father (for a second I thought there might have been), who he found charming, because my father is very charming. We talked about swans and horses and the London elections and the people we know.

When it's rained recently I have felt elated, on my bike getting to work soaked through but happy, unable to see because of my glasses and noticing the damp bluebells and finally green. Or cycling home and only knowing it's raining because the puddles pucker, the sky still looks like the end of the world and in a months time I can travel, or get on a train, or do whatever I like. I will go to the sea.

And everything will be ok, because nothing was wrong afterall.