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There is a version of slow living that looks very beautiful on the internet. Linen curtains. A sourdough loaf cooling on a wooden board. Someone walking barefoot through a garden with a cup of tea, unhurried, unbothered, with apparently nowhere else to be. And then there is your actual life. The alarm, the commute, the…
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I didn’t choose slow living. Slow living chose me — or rather, burnout chose it for me, and I followed along because there was nothing else left to do. I’ve written before about what burnout looks like when it arrives, and what happens in the aftermath. But I haven’t written much about what it actually…
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There’s a particular kind of morning that only exists in summer. The light is already golden but the air is still cool, the birds are mid-conversation, and the day hasn’t yet become the heavy, slow thing it will be by afternoon. On the hottest days, I’m up by five to catch it — doing tai…
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There’s a particular kind of embarrassment that comes with living somewhere beautiful and taking it entirely for granted. I’ve walked past the Semois river more times than I can count without really stopping. I’ve driven through Ny in summer — past all those overflowing flower boxes, geraniums tumbling out of every window — and thought…
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My work comes in stretches. Months fully booked, every day accounted for, and then — nothing. A project ends and the next one hasn’t started yet, and there’s a gap where there used to be structure. The first morning of one of those gaps, I’m usually awake earlier than I need to be. I lie…
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The feature photo on this post is from that trip — me sitting cross-legged on a beach in Brittany, Luke’s head resting on my leg, both of us just sitting there with nothing in particular happening. It was a solo trip, just me and the dogs. They’re getting older now, and long days on the…
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City trips often begin with good intentions. The thought of a few days away. A change of scenery. The pleasure of walking streets that aren’t your own. And yet, somewhere between booking the train, packing the car, and arriving at the hotel, the trip can quietly turn into a plan — a list of places,…
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Slow living is often pictured in wide kitchens and country houses. Wooden tables. Linen curtains. Gardens stretching beyond the window. But many people live in apartments. Small ones. Above traffic, below neighbours, with limited storage and walls close enough that sound travels easily. And somewhere in the back of their mind lives a quiet, persistent…
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There’s something humbling about being confronted with who you once were. She found me on LinkedIn last year, nearly thirty years after we’d lost touch from school. I remembered her name before I remembered much else — she remembered everything. The house I grew up in. My parents. Afternoons I’d completely forgotten were ever part…
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One morning I stepped outside and realised I wasn’t bracing. All winter, stepping out the door has meant tightening — shoulders up, breath shorter, hands searching for pockets. But that morning, the air met my face differently. The sun had warmth in it. Not dramatic warmth. Just enough to soften the edges. Later, walking through…
