Jonathan: It’s two years ago today that I started these blogs, and nearly two years since my journey home to Uist from ‘exile’ – living away from home, in SE England, for the sake of the income from a full-time job. This blog has become a scrapbook of life since then, arbitrary and patchy perhaps, but in the longer term amounting to an accurate and honest record of the hopes and fears, the highs and lows of the life we live. If nothing else, it’s been a period of unrelenting work, much of it bringing little or no reward, yet inescapable other than by giving up and going under. Yet beyond the everyday reports of strain and struggle, the underlying narrative is of faith in the intrinsic value of what we do, and the way we do it, and a tenous belief that our labour and integrity will bear good fruit in time. Some raspberries would be nice!