Fluctuating Fortunes.

I have a regular phone call date with Mel every Sunday, and today we agreed that they’re not really phone calls any more. They’re woe-exchange sessions now, because we’re both going through phases in our lives when nearly everything that happens is woeful. We also agreed that it’s becoming a bit tedious.

But then, by an odd coincidence, two non-woeful things happened to me later.

The first involved a young woman coming down the lane on a horse. She kept looking at me in a way that suggested recognition, and when she got to the closest point of approach she smiled and said ‘hi.’ She was with a young man who was also riding a horse (a different one, unsurprisingly) and he ignored me altogether. Suddenly, and for the first time in a long time, the world seemed to be operating properly. And the fact that I still haven’t a clue who the woman was adds an air of mystery which doesn’t go amiss.

The second was just as exciting but in a different way. I’m always on the lookout for DVDs to see me through the long, dark nights of autumn, but I can rarely think of anything which takes my fancy and, when I do, it’s too expensive. Tonight I remembered Wallander, the Swedish cop drama English language version starring Kenneth Branagh. I watched several episodes over one winter some years ago, sitting in my living room with an open fire burning in the grate, and became quite fond of the character and the stories. I even remember getting some blog posts out of it. So I went onto eBay, expecting them to have it at some exorbitant price, and guess what I found. Series 1-3, 6 discs, £4.53 including postage. It’s on order.

So is this the start of better fortune, or just three weird sisters operating in the background, winning me with honest trifles to betray me in deepest consequence? I mean, look what happened to Macbeth. Do I want to go there?