I was taking a break between marking essays in the middle of the afternoon when I thought it might be a good wheeze to listen to a bit of the altogether wonderful Richard Hawley. I duly put on Coles Corner, a firm favourite, and abandoned myself to the title track, the first on the album. It's probably the most romantically yearning song I know, not least because of its associations with the actual Coles Corner, a spot familiar to me from the years I spent in the great city of steel. (There's a gorgeous live version of the tune here, if it's not familiar to you.)
Now I'm not exactly the most nostalgic person I know; generally I'd regard myself as wary of over-much luxuriating in the past. You can't go back, even if you go back. But I spent the remaining running time of the CD trying to deal with memory after intense memory - initially of Sheffield and then places beyond, and the friends associated with them. It was both comforting and sad.
It's not often I go back to my marking with a sense of relief.
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