I still exist

It has been a turbulent three months during which I have not blogged.

We have now settled in our new town and feel very much at home there. But we have still not successfully bought a property, and have not fully resolved the question of church. On housing we had many failed attempts at purchasing, which fell foul of new rules making it harder to buy a property for mixed domestic and business use. So now we are buying a much smaller terraced house (still quite big by most standards) and a chalet on a holiday park for the business. But we are still waiting for the closure of the sale of our old house, whose purchaser has had her own mortgage difficulties. We are optimistic that the light at the end of the tunnel is getting closer.

On church, I have settled for the razzmatazz cinema church, which is theologically too conservative for me but is the best for my son, and since we dragged him to this town kicking and screaming against his will we have prioritised his wishes in selecting a church.

But it is in the next town, and Mrs with her disability and lack of driving needs to be somewhere where she can get involved midweek. She also needs to be a person in her own right not overshadowed by me. And recently following the churches together group, I think she wants to be a member f the church in the town as a whole rather than just one congregation - a floater but in a positive sense.

Work wise, my contract only delivered 3 days a week of work during autumn which was very painful to the finances. This contract is now suddenly very busy again, but ends at the end of the month. senior managers have decided not to have contract staff as a policy decision, without reference to the service that these individuals provide and will be lost by that decision. Based on an interview this morning, I should start with a new client on the first working day in February - not quite a done deal yet but nearly there. With this I will be about £50 per week less well off, but that should be offset by unforeseen advantages.

Commuting has been bad recently. The 75 mile journey from my new town is a minimum of 1 hr 20 minutes, but that has been stretched to 2 hours by serious long term roadworks which should carry on for another 6 weeks. For my new client I will need to add 5 miles and some rush hour city traffic, but travelling after the worst of it I should not be too badly off.

So it is all change, but beginning to settle.

And one day the pain of the last year and the failed case may eventually start to ease, but it still feels very raw and it is still hard to distinguish between a cry for justice and a cry for vengeance.