WORDS

For as long as I can remember, I’ve been an avid reader and writer.

The consequences of this constant appetite for the written word were a degree in English Literature at University College London, and in 2014, the self-publication of my novel, LACUNA.

During a long career in the coffee industry I was often called upon to translate, to advertise, to create; as a sourcer/taster of beans to transmute mercurial flavours and aromas into words and expressions. 

Immersion in a new language, and in various new lexicons, has focused and sharpened my feelings about my own mother tongue.

WOODS

After competing in cross country as a youth, I got back into running again in 2012. 

Above and beyond keeping fit, it was a movement through green space which grabbed me. The feeling of being an element within an unfolding and live tapestry of leaves and breath and birdsong. 

Imagine my delight when I discovered the Vienna Woods, not long after arriving here in 2015. 

The Wienerwald remains my green sanctuary today, where even after almost five years, my feet (as if of their own volition) still lead me down new and hidden paths.

Reading and running; running and reading. 

Practically speaking I do these two discrete things because they are abilities I have; yet the idea insinuates itself that these two services are actually very similar, and somehow subliminally linked.

Is navigating a thorny text not a little like trying to pick a path through overgrown brush?

Is running free and unconstrained through trees and dappled sunlight not similar to reading a flowing, untrammelled sentence?

To me, the feelings are almost the same: 

The shadows, and the clarity; The challenge, and the freedom;

The words and the woods.