I am now a qualified lifeguard. Well, more accurately, I have a lifeguard qualification. I am not currently “practising” as a lifeguard, not yet being paid to guard life as it were.

In my last post, I used the term “self-isolating”. To think that only a few weeks ago that hyphenated pairing held no great significance beyond mind-forged manacles or auto-imposed incarceration. So far, the COVID’s not affected me much personally apart from a couple-of-days course postponement. I’m lucky to have graduated last year and to have been on my year abroad in Germany during the strikes and snow closures.

Bond’s been put off until October. Sad that Billie Eilish track won’t get the momentum it deserves. I think its quite classy. Much better than Sam Smith I have to say.

Yes, the immediate learning of the National Pool Lifeguard Qualification’s done now and I’m looking for the next thing. What form that will take is as of yet unknown.

Right now, I’m trying to be a social media guru. I’ve recently taken up running the Fursbreck Pottery Facebook page. Hopefully, this will be a good opportunity to develop my filming and photography skills.

From April I’ll be at Skara Brae full time. Nine to five, five out of seven. Exhausted at the thought. But to cater to whom? It looks like cruises are being cancelled across the board. Even that relative certainty is slipping away.

Passengers in their thousands ordinarily. The title of that Chris Pratt/Jennifer Lawrence flick of a few years ago. Sci-fi films are the best. Even the shit ones are better. Cosmic horror is my favourite kind. Sickening despair. Passengers had a brilliant five minutes where that was all there was and no way out. In the end, though, it just seemed to live out a control fantasy that it so nearly condemned as irredeemably unethical before serving up the genocide prevention get out clause.

I need a new drive. Remember my Corsa tearing up the drive? And I mean literally. Carving a channel in the chips. As in aggregate, as in one step up from scalpings in terms of coarseness.

Changes are afoot. Not everyone’s returning for season 2. Remember when we used to say series? Netflix’s fault.

Getting along grand with my Gaelic. Well, grander than at first. Not that that’s the same thing. Craic’s Scots don’t you know? Used to be spelt phonetically too. With a “ck” and no intrusive “I”. ‘Tis a Hebridean appropriation to be sure.

And now I’m under no obligation to reprise my role what with this fixed term contract and all. Which I’ve not signed but I’m keen to at the earliest. Guaranteed employment’s not to be sniffed at (or dry coughed at) in this climate.

I’m experiencing the most minimal disruption possible. My only burden’s psychological. And even then, not personal. I just have to live with everyone else getting seriously wound up.

Who knows what will happen come September? Wake me up when September ends.

One thing new in my life; work I can do from home. You might remember my St Magnus Mugs videos from a couple of weeks ago. Well, that led to a gig managing the Harray Potter’s Facebook page – that way if quarantine is enforced, I still have something to fall back on. And I don’t go out that much ordinarily, so self-isolation will come quite naturally.

No, I am thinking long term now. I’ve allowed myself. When September ends. If by the end of September, I am not in graduate employment and/or not on the way to a career in journalism, I think I must return to education. I keep circling around the same topics, returning again to language, history, heritage, old ways, new ways, alternate ways. A speech that is felt, deliberate, of the landscape, part of the environment, not merely stumbled upon, slipped into, dismissed as inconsequential. Am I prepared to unearth forgotten tongues? Rake up myths long-buried? Pan for precious gold in stagnant pools?

Yes, I am, and I will if necessary. It’s beyond contemplation.

Is that coherent though? Does it make sense? The life I’ve led does not add up. But we’re far from the end of the arithmetic.

Right now, there is little for me here. Orkney will forever remain dear to me. Right now, though, it’s also costing me dear. Progression is my top priority. In every aspect of my life. There’s only so far you can move on in the bedroom of your family home.