I stopped writing because I knew my life this year was going to be subsumed by Malory Towers (for those following at home, my Louisa-coined pseudonym for the boarding school currently employing me). Now I'm starting again, because while I live here and work here and often don't leave the grounds for days - though I will once I get off house duty in fifteen minutes' time, because I'm all out of milk - I find it doesn't subsume me, quite. There's stuff to write about besides the nitty-gritty of school, fascinating though I occasionally find it. And it's probably good for me to get back into the narrative habit.

That said, my eyes are fried from too much screen time today and the milk is calling me. So, as catching up the last three months (three months! a quarter-year! God) is probably impossible at the moment, I'm going to leave it at a brief snapshot of my situation right now:
- an empty box of dark chocolate-flavour chips (chips as in chocolate-chips, not crisps, ew) on the desk, which I have had no part in emptying
- red brick, wet grass, red berries in the trees outside
- loud ticking noises
- hospital standby phone, not ringing
- mild headache, to be resolved shortly with fresh, though rainy, air.

I have moments of "how did I get here, exactly?" pretty often, and I think they're salutary; it makes you appreciate things. The last time was on my birthday, a cold Armistice Sunday, standing in the middle of a hedgerow. You start to retrace your steps and realize how extremely unlikely it is that you should be here now.