There is a light...

I have an apology to make. Emerging on the other side of 50 in a whirl of social celebration, I see that I have not been myself. Two dirges on something as banal as politics tell me that I have rushed to the surface too quickly, some time before I had intended to take the air. It was a case of the bends. Too many people, too much activity, too little time for contemplation. So, I’m sorry. I shall henceforth return to the depths to resume a colourful relationship with the denizens of my imagination, my true world. There you will again recognise me. Then, what I have to offer the world - through words and branding and general advice about how to get to the heart of things and communicate this essence – will once more make sense. For this reminder to return to a state of grace, I have the following to thank: Alain De Botton for The Architecture of Happiness; a painting by Marc Brown that I wish I’d bought on a visit to Southwold; Sean Lock for making me laugh in his narration for The Great British Sunday, on BBC 4 last night; and a brilliant photograph I took of light fading over the 21st Century Museum of Modern Art in Kanazawa a couple of months ago. I write this as a constant reflection on identity. And to keep a record of what matters to me. For, in these blogs, and only in these blogs, even after millions of words written over decades of life, have I found it possible to say what I need to say, from the place that I need to say it. And, sometimes, this is only possible in the middle of the night.

Mark Griffiths www.idealconsulting.co.uk