Reflections 9th January

Hallmarks. Birmingham Assay Office

On my Mind

Identity. As we find our way into 2022, amidst the newsfeeds dominated by high energy low value content which may capture our attention but will make not one jot of difference to our lives, just where do we ground ourselves? What do we hang onto to prevent ourselves, and the purpose of our lives, being washed away in this tsunami of relative trivia? What, and who, do we connect to?

One of questions I have been playing with is what is i that we produce that identifies us? My grandfather was a stone setter in Birmingham, and we still have jewellery made by him for my grandmother. I never met him – he was a casualty of war – but the jewellery he made, and why he made it, creates a sense of connection. My grandfather in law was a preacher, and I have on the desk in front of me a beautiful little box he made which contained little rolls of paper with extracts from the Psalms he would use a prompt for sermons. Neither have any great material value,…