Steve’s List:

1. Work hard and be nice to people (two things but inseparable)
2. Do my tax return
3. Trust my instincts
4. Accept criticism gracefully
5. Read a little every day
6. Walk the dog
7. Daydream often; procrastinate less
8. Make more 3-minute phone calls
9. Convert the garage into a workspace
10. Share (especially via Instagram)
11. Eat more fruit bananas
12. Collaborate with others to bring @hardlynormal over to the UK
13. Make people laugh
14. Make my family proud
15. Post here more regularly, as I promised I would
16. Keep Friday evenings special – i.e. film night with @gicela
17. Build more bridges
18. Understand what my daughters need from me (besides extra pocket money)
19. Be there for my dad as he starts his fight against prostate cancer
20. Help charities get to where they need to get to quicker
21. Work hard and be nice to people

* It has been a fortnight of mud and rainbows; of roast turkey and cider. Most of all, mud. In the few months since we’ve become dog owners - pinch me; how did this happen - I’ve grown to cherish our daily walks in the waterlogged fields down the lane that runs behind our little house. When the girls are off school this is something we do together as a family. We slop and squelch about on the Moors, where the grazing marsh is criss-crossed by an interconnecting network of ditches (known locally as rhynes) which in mid-winter drain the floodwater from the fields.

Whatever your goals and dreams, and wherever you may be on that journey, I hope that some of them come true in 2012.

Update: Soon after I hit ‘publish’, I stumbled upon Taking 18 Minutes Day Towards A Year-Long Focus, which Beth also posted today. It really resonated with me, as I have also decided to focus on a handful of themes this year. I didn’t include them in My List; they merit posts of their own, so watch this space.

On a good day the high speed rail journey from my home village in Somerset to London lasts two hours and four minutes. If I get a window seat on the left hand side, just after half way there’s a glimpse of a spinney (as we say in my neck of the woods) marooned in a field. Last Thursday the clouds moved majestically across the sky and danced with those trees.

This weekend, downpours have come to a colourful end with spectacular rainbows. For me, these last days of summer bring with them a couple of exciting new projects. I’m ready.

I have decamped from a week with the family under canvas with enough memories to fill a year with daydreams. Luminous blue sea; low and empty sandy beaches; seagulls and fish and chips. Thank you, Cornwall; my vision has been swept clear and bright by the Atlantic breeze and there is much work to be done.

You know when a number of things align so completely you want to capture the moment for all time? These ‘moments’ cannot be anticipated or planned for, and the sheer joy of them is hard to put into words, but may last a lifetime. The emotion cannot be manufactured; I simply fall into the rhythm as the moment unfolds. It’s when I feel most alive.

If I close my eyes; think harder… a few more memories surface and slowly reveal themselves; like polaroids. Very small moments in my life; that enthralled. Often there’s a soundtrack, like C’est le Bon, which instantly transports me back to a cornfield during the summer of 1983.

Which brings me to yesterday evening. Who would have thought that wolfing down some fish and chips on the seafront in Clevedon with my family would hit such a high note. Just in case, I’m bookmarking it with this post… much as a reader might lovingly turn down a page to mark a favourite passage.

I recommend a week in Valencia in late May. Enough of the jacarandas are still in bloom, yet many of the trumpet-shaped flowers have fallen to form vivid lilac-blue carpets of blossom.

I’ve just returned from a stupendous week in the English Lake District. Very intermittent signal, so plenty of time for family, walking, and thinking.

I have promised myself that I will post more regularly here from the beginning of May.

Here’s a link to the photo set on Flickr.