Reading by candlelight...

At night we light candles in our living room, a long line of them on the mantelpiece, just tea lights encased in glowing glass globes, penny tea lights, a circle of wax inside a metal ring with a wick at its centre - a little light, a little warmth, big glow of comfort.

There’s something in that candlelight that’s like nothing else except maybe the glow of an open fire. We have that too on chilly evenings. Candlelight and fire – there’s nothing quite like it, there I’m repeating myself and there’s comfort in that as well. It knocks all the central heating and fluorescent lights into a cocked hat. Not that I know why anything should get knocked into a cocked hat or why it should be a cocked hat rather than a bowler or a topper. That's one in the picture, or at least how I imagine one to be.

Sometimes I also imagine what the world would be like if fire and candles were all we had for light and heat, like in the ‘olden days’ as we called them way back when. Just how could anybody read by candlelight? On the few occasions that I’ve been dropped into a power-cut candles have seemed so wholly inadequate as a lighting source to manage by. Cosy and comforting, but a little short on light for reading.

Still, for a long time that’s all there was until suddenly the world moved forwards and all of the candlestick makers set sail for other shores on a baked potato in a tiny bucket of water.

So here’s my point: the world moves forward and suddenly nobody wants your candles. It leaves you in the dark for a while, floating this way and that in your bucket inside a baked potato and then after a while you just get used to it – like reading by candlelight I guess.

Note to self: under no circumstance allow them to make the world move on from felt tip pens.