May, as it does, arrived with the aggressive optimism of a month that knows it's the best month and intends to make sure you know it too. Blossom on everything. The evenings suddenly going light until nine. The city remembering how to be pleasant. April was the bigger month emotionally. But there's a run-up to get through first — Hamburg, Auckland, and a ski trip I am still finding evidence of in my washbag. Here's the year so far.

I've been back from Auckland for a week and I'm still not entirely sure what to do with myself. The jet lag is mostly gone but something else is still settling, and I'm going to try to write about it before it does, because once it settles I suspect it will become harder to see clearly. Three weeks in New Zealand. Our first time back since August 2013. Gemma's first time back since she was thirteen. I'm going to have to write this slowly.

We landed at Heathrow on a Tuesday morning in late August, and Richard was in a cab to the City before I'd properly found my feet on English soil. I stood there with two suitcases, a hand luggage bag, and a thirteen-year-old who was looking at England with the careful, guarded expression of someone who has been told this is going to be wonderful and is reserving judgement. She was born in Auckland. She has never lived anywhere else. England, to Gemma, is a place her parents a