I don’t believe in New Year resolutions. Nevertheless. Here I am.

When we were first married Shaun said, You must write every day. Make it your Commonplace Book.

What’s a Commonplace Book? I said.

Jottings. Observations. Opinions. Anything you like. And it must be every day.

Shaun doesn’t often tell me what to do. How good my life could be if I always did what he says! He must have pre-empted the blog by several decades.

I love the idea of a Commonplace Book. I am frightened of blogging, though.

Of tabloid misinterpretations of my life. You know: I offer the Mail a diary on giving up booze for Lent and before I know it I’m a certified alcoholic. Or an article on how our daughter’s devastating inherited mental illness has been so dreadfully exacerbated by medication, and by the time the editors have finished the poor girl is a pothead.

Of all the ghastly green ink on Twitter. I don’t know where all this horrible vitriol on the internet comes from. I do know it’s vile. I don’t want to be recipient of it — any more than I already am; than everyone is, simply by doing anything more public than sitting by the fire and sneezing. As soon as we walk out of our houses it seems, we are fired at with malignant venom by anyone who feels out of sorts with the world.

Perhaps most of all, frightened of being boring. Why would you want to read my jottings?

And perhaps you won’t. Never mind. I will be doing what Shaun suggested and that is always a good thing.

So, here is the first of my daily blogs. Welcome to 2018: God bless us, every one.

And welcome to my Commonplace Book.