Still here. Just quiet.

It’s been a while.

I’d like to say the silence was intentional — a planned break, or time to gather thoughts. But really, it’s just been life. A difficult stretch of it.

This past year’s been one of the hardest.
I lost Helga in December.

She didn’t have an easy start to life. No one to look after her, living rough on the streets. She was taken in by the municipal capture, spay and release programme in Burgas — but they botched the job. Her spine was damaged at the base, leaving her tail lifeless and making her incontinent. A careless mistake that changed everything for her.

I rescued her on 2nd March 2020 — right around the time people were busy panic-buying and eating toilet paper. She was around 1½ years old. Nervous, scrappy, and already carrying the weight of what she'd been through.

We figured things out together. With some patience and the right medicine, we managed her incontinence. She was terrified of thunder — far more than most dogs. It wasn’t just fear, it was complete panic. She could only be calm around me.

Near the end of last year, her leg started giving her trouble — a joint was failing. We took her to the vet several times and followed their treatment plan exactly. They gave her pain relief and something to help the joint, and we stayed on it for as long as they advised. But a month passed with no improvement, and we made the call to go ahead with surgery.

That’s when they found the real problem. Her liver was in terrible shape — likely from the medication.

She stayed at the clinic for two weeks, on fluids, kept in a kennel. Still fighting. But she wasn’t getting better. On her final day, she could barely move. And on 12th December 2024, we had to make the hardest decision. The vets said there was no path forward for her except pain. She was still trying, but there was nothing left to try for.

Letting her go broke me. It still does. She was far too young. She should’ve had so much more time. If 2 souls could be connected, it was mine and hers. I loved her with all my heart and I have a huge hole in my heart that is not healing but rather getting worse with time.

They say time heals, but I've been struggling to see this as being true.

Skip ahead a few months later, I’d just been chatting with my friend Frank Harrison about plans — BBQs in the summer, beers, a projector film night in the garden. Something light, something to look forward to.

And then, out of nowhere a few days later, on the morning of 1st April 2025, he died of a heart attack.
RIP my friend Frank. 1963–2025. I lost a great friend Frank, you were one of the kindest and most genuine people I’ve ever had the pleasure of knowing.

So that’s where I’ve been. Somewhere between grief, work, and trying to keep up with life — broken bits of the house, the wild garden, and not much left in the tank after any of it.

But I want to start posting again. Writing. Building. Getting back to the things that feel like mine.

Still here. Just quiet.