In the manner of the old portrait photographers, I asked Ron and his parents to sit for me for a photograph on Christmas day.In the manner of those old photographers, I directed them to their seats, asked them to hold props, and because it was a long exposure, I requested that they smiled and on the count of three, held their breath. And I took one last shot that would complete the series.

In truth, it wasn’t meant to be the final 52, I had other plans that would link my last 52 with the something new I would work on next year but  even while I was taking that shot, I knew it would never become part of this set. But I still have other plans for it.

For now it’s in my camera, and though it won’t stay too long, it can take its time to be developed. There’s no rush any more, and I like the way that feels.

Amongst the 52ers, there’s been a lot of discussion about who is carrying on next year and who isn’t. Like students after the graduation ceremony, some are going their own way, others are sticking around. And though it might not be my last self portrait project, after two years, I’m done with the regular posting schedule. I want to get back to taking the shots I like when I like. I’m looking forward to getting Vlad out because I want to, not because I have to get something produced for a deadline.

But it’s been a fun ride. I’ve learnt a lot about the limitations of turning a manual focus camera on yourself, and of the joy of putting myself in the sweet spot of the lens on the times I’ve got it right.  And I’ve looked forward to the end of every week when I could find out what the other 52ers have been up to. I’ve appreciated all the comments and been chuffed at all the people who have clicked on the link and read the blog post.

It’s not the end of anything, but a new beginning, and that’s what New Years are all about.

So Happy New Year everybody. See you on the other side.

The good thing about having a birthday so close to Christmas is that it’s easy to get away from it all - while everyone else is last minute shopping or decking their halls, while the Christmas and New Year breakers haven’t started packing,  the hotels are virtually empty.

This year Ron and I decided to head for a remote part of the Lake District and stay in a hotel in the middle of nowhere. It’s a romantic kind of place, with a lounge complete with winged armchairs and a roaring fire, and brass beds in every room - I mean, just look at it -  I couldn’t wait. The plan was to arrive on Friday night and head out on the hill the next day for a birthday walk over Crinkle Crags.

That was the plan, but December weather being what it is a fall back position is vital. We’d thought about checking out the opposition at Sellafield, but it’s closed on weekends. We could wander around the outdoor shops, pubs and tearooms of Ambleside. And if it was wet but not actually raining we could go and out and take photos of something.

The weather forecast warned of blizzards, melting snow, heavy rain and flash floods - not the best conditions for mountain hiking.  So in the car on the way up there, Ron presented me with a list of waterfalls we could visit and photograph in full flow if we couldn’t get out and climb mountains. I was impressed by his foresight and put the papers in the pocket of the car door.

We made good progress for much of the way until a hold up signalled the first of the many challenges we were to encounter. A car was stuck in a flooded stretch of road but we got through it. Little did we know that it was the first of countless flooded stretches  up to two feet deep in places. In the worst we met a car coming towards us and a wave broke over the top of our car, blinding us and sending us scuttling sideways. With drystone walls lining both sides of the narrow road, it was a miracle that we didn’t crash into something.

But after a nerve-racking 40 minute drive through flooded roads we got to the Old Dungeon Ghyll intact - the only damage was the loss of the list of waterfalls which flew out of the door caught by the high winds and driving rain the minute we’d parked up and got out.

We left our stuff in our attic room and headed for the residents bar where we met the members of Coniston Mountain Rescue who were having a Christmas meal and ceilidh in the dining room. They invited us to join them but we stayed in the bar and sampled the local ales. After the drive, I couldn’t take any more excitement that evening.

I woke up on my birthday to grey skies and a pile of gifts. Somehow Ron had managed to get hold some amazing presents including a leather case for Vlad, and an old school Polaroid Land Camera that came with a gorgeous flashgun (I just need to get my hands on some flashbulbs).

Th birthday walk didn’t really get off the ground - in truth it got around 1,000 feet off the ground before rain stopped play and we headed off for tea and free wifi in Ambleside. Did I mention that our hotel was so away from it all that here was no internet, no mobile phone or television reception? And on Sunday morning the landlines went down too, which meant we couldn’t actually pay our bill.

On Sunday morning there were gale force winds and the hotel staff were about to send out a search party for the only other guests before we told them we’d seen them come back the night before. But we were lucky, though the wind howled along the valley so that in our hotel room the roof creaked and shook and it sounded like an avalanche was approaching, the winds died down and we managed to chase one more waterfall and take a ferry journey across Lake Windermere before the rain came bucketing down and we headed for home.

All in all, a taxtbook birthday.

Inspired by the close up, honest shots from flickr friends Dumbfunk and Al Hermann, I realised that this whole year that while I’ve sat and posed, and stood and posed and sometimes even lay down and posed, I’ve never got that close.

There are practical difficulties. Shooting on  a medium format camera with only one lens doesn’t make it easy. Even with my 2x converter it’s hard to get that close, and using available light getting the focus right can be an issue when the depth of field is limited to a few mm. And then there are the things about my face. Laughter lines. Wrinkles. Birthmarks.  All the things I’d rather keep to myself.

Al in particular inspired me, because he took the honest shot and then commented on it. Honestly.

But though I can’t hope to emulate that with my 80mm lens and my fast running out pack film, I gave it my best shot. I know my hand got in the way of the flash, casting a shadow on my face. I know there is too much junk in the background, but Christmas is fast approaching and those presents need to stay there until they’re wrapped. And though you can’t see much of the large pores, the wrinkles and the sunken cheeks, they are there. Trust me. But that surly expression is clear enough. Along with deep laughter lines that prove that in all these years, there have been a lot of smiles and a fair amount of laughter too.

Last weekend I went to Hamburg to visit fellow Blad owner and good friend keksofant. We hung out at her place, drank weissbier, ate schnitzel, went to the Christmas markets, the funfair and drank glühwein. And took  a lot of photos.

At the funfair, keks gave me a roll of Portra film, so I could shoot with a higher ISO. Digital shooters don’t need to worry about such things - when the light fails they can just wind up the ISO. With film it’s just not that easy, but there are other benefits. Each different film type has certain characteristics, and when you work with them over time you can get to spot the rich reds and blues of Velvia, the saturation of Provia. But until now, Portra hadn’t been a favourite. I’d used it once or twice and found it too yellowy, and to be honest, washed out. But this was 400 ISO film and for the most part I was going to be shooting night skies and funfair rides, so the chances of it being washed out, I reasoned, were slim.

Having spent 7 hours at the funfair, fortified by bratwurst, chocolate-covered grapes on sticks, sugared almonds, all washed down with a liberal dose of glühwein, I was convinced I’d got some pretty good shots. So I sent the film away and for the first time since I’ve had Vlad, I got prints made. And the thing about medium format is that you can’t get budget prints, you can only get  “professional-quality, video analysed, colour-corrected fixed format prints” so that’s what I got.

So this shot has been colour corrected and printed by a lab (then scanned and colour corrected again so this version looks like the print).  And instead of a yellowy washed out print, this is what I got  and I’m pretty damn pleased with it. Though the white walls have come out pink, all the other colours are spot on. I don’t remember the light in the room being this lavender colour, but the eye does have a habit of colour-correcting so that you don’t see the tones in different light sources. And whether it’s a property of the film or a light source in the room, nothing beats the excitement of getting the film back and finding something totally unexpected in the prints.

And that, ladies and gentleman, is why I love to shoot film.

The funfair shots will be posted on Flickr in the coming days, but in some ways I think this is the best of the lot.

This morning, when I got up the hills were covered with a thick sprinkling of snow. A sliver of dawn light, rose, yellow and indigo, sat on the skyline. Everything was veiled in a thin layer of white, and the sky was eggshell blue in one direction and electric in the other.

Now as I sit at my desk and write this before I begin my working day, the clouds above Castle Naze glow pink as the sun gets up. It is exquisite.

It’s the kind of morning that reminds me of sunrise in the Alps, when the air is crisp and quiet, and the snow turns from predawn grey to blue and pink before the sunlight hits and it is white again.

Now the workmen have arrived to carry on the interminable building of the neighbours’ porches, and it reminds me that I need to get on. If only I can tear my eyes from that pink sky and those white dusted hills.

This pub, the Lantern Pike, is just down the road from another one of those impossible cottages that I would love to buy. Only this time I decided to be practical and check out the internet connection at the cottage  before I went to look around and fell completely in love with the place. It is a bit out of the way and, well, Internet isn’t really an option there. So no, we won’t be buying the little place within a stone’s throw of this pub where Tony Warren, sat and wrote episodes of Coronation Street.

When I was there, it was the perfect English pub, a couple with a smiling baby bouncing on his father’s knee in one corner. Some locals enjoying a leisurely lunch over weekend newspapers by the window, and a group of walkers welcomed despite the muddy boots and bums (one of them had slid down the hill to the pub) and us, by the fire enjoying a pint of Timothy Taylors landlord ale.

So I’ve found my ideal pub - one where I can imagine myself stealing that window seat and having lunch while my imagination started working. Afterwards, when the lunch things were cleared away I’d settle down and write a few hundred words. A café, or even a pub if it’s the right one, somewhere away from home where you can retreat when you need a change of scene in order to think is one of the few things a writer really needs. And I really think I found it there.

Now all I need is the house to go with it.

When you were twenty, if you stopped to imagine the future, what would you have seen?

My twenty-year-old self would have imagined life in London, because after 2 years away at university she missed it so much she couldn’t imagine living anywhere else.

My twenty-year-old self would not believe she’d have moved as far north as Manchester, but she might have believed she would live in France, though she would have imagined Paris not the unfashionable east with its rural life and unforgettable battlefields.

She would have refused to consider that she might spend 8 years of her life in Amsterdam, not so much because of the prostitution and the cannabis, but because it was never really on her radar.

Though that twenty-year-old self didn’t yet dream of being a writer, her 34 year old counterpart swore that she would one day live in the Peak district, work part time and spend the afternoons working on her novel. But would have believe that she’d spend all the day writing - the mornings reporting facts and the afternoons shaping fiction?

The twenty-year-old wouldn’t have believed that she’d spend the next ten years of her life in a relationship that wasn’t all that good for her, nor would she be able to comprehend that she might finally meet the illusive right person just five years later. Relationships weren’t on her radar either.

Though she liked walking across the fields from University to the tearoom in Kenilworth, she would never have believed that someone like her, with a fear of heights, would climb mountains and cross glaciers.

She would never have considered that a bereavement could break her heart and at the same time set her free.

And if she had been able to convince herself that she would leave not just London but England altogether for ten whole years she’d have laughed if I told her that coming back would be so easy.

And would she have believed that this week, two friends from those days have got in touch with her after a more than twenty year gap?

I took this shot in a pub that I had dreams of being my local. In truth I still do, even though I haven’t found the house yet.

How fast things have moved on since that day. It turns out that I’m not such a city girl after all. I love my walks around town, and weekend hikes on the hill. I even love the rumble of the freight train late at night.  I don’t miss the shops or the traffic, or the drunks on Deansgate on a Friday night. And though the pubs in my town aren’t quite like this one, they’re close enough to the real thing.

One of my dreams of living in the countryside was to get out on the hill every day I could. I had a romantic notion of packing my laptop, or pen and paper, in my rucksack and setting off for somewhere quiet and beautiful where I would spend whole afternoons staring at the skies and writing perfect prose. Reality hasn’t worked out that way of course, it’s been cold and wet, or I’ve been too busy so today was the first weekday since I moved in that I went out for a country walk. Though I had a vague plan and a map in my pocket I wasn’t entirely sure where my footsteps would take me until I found a road that led me to a house we thought about buying a few months back. Not that one but another that came quite close, but in the end was too much for us to take on.

I changed my mind a dozen times but in the end my feet took me along the lane that makes my heart leap when I catch sight of the hills to the left and right, the horses and sheep grazing in the fields, the dry stone walls and further on, the ducks that paddle and quack in a flooded corner.

I wanted someone to have bought it, to take that dilapidated old house that had once been the grandest in the area but now was full of mildew and cobwebs and patches of rot and turn it into something loved. And when I saw the sold sign discarded on the overgrown lawn and the skip outside the garage I was glad. I walked on up the lane I once dreamt of taking to for my early morning run, and I was glad for the person who could look forward to all this.

But later, on the way back down, I heard voices and caught sight of the builder heaving in a bag of cement through the open front door and it brought an inexplicable tear to my eye. I thought of all the hope and the dreams invested in that house, of the other people’s lives that would flourish there once it was made into a home. And I wished it was me.

I have no reason to feel that way, I could have bought the house and made it my own, and I chose to walk away. And yet.

I hope they keep the old panelled doors and restore the beautiful parquet floor. I hope they don’t change the crazy angled hallways. I hope they put in a new kitchen diner where they can have friends round for dinner, light a fire in the lounge and sit looking out at the sunset on the hills beyond the garden. I hope that when they bought that place they imagined all those things or other things, but most of all I hope that someone has taken that house who will make it into their home.

As for me, I am happy where I am. I haven’t found my dream home yet but until I find it, for as long as it takes, this place where I am will do fine.

Until this weekend, I’ve never bought a poppy for Remembrance Sunday. Not a red one anyway. In the nineties, I used to buy white peace poppies but I always thought of the red ones as too patriotic, jingoistic even.

But that all changed forever when I moved to France. Try living in the heart of some of the bloodiest World War I battlefields and not changing your mind. From my window where I sat and worked on my novel every day for almost two years, I could see across town to the battlefields beyond. Every time walk I took, every bike ride, even driving out of town it was hard to avoid them.

So it was inevitable that I would explore those beautiful and terrible wide open spaces. Bike rides could be treacherous - I slowed down once after I spotted a glint of metal on the trail - and bent down to examine a bullet case. When I was there shells and bombs were still being discovered, and there were occasional rumours of tourists armed with metal detectors who if they were lucky survived the blast when they got up close to a great war souvenir.

The area around Verdun is full of the bones of the dead. Whole villages that were destroyed in bomb attacks. There’s the ossuary (there’s no English translation for a building that contains the bones of 120,000 unknown French soldiers and countless German soldiers) at Douaumont. The outside walls are covered with the names of the regiments who lost men in the battle of Verdun, and inside the names of those missing in action cover every square inch of space. And yes, you can see the bones through windows in the outer wall. It’s a sobering sight.  Outside in the cemetery, 15,000 of those whose names were known are buried in rows of graves that stretch on into an infinity of crosses. The Muslim soldiers are there too with arched grave stones that point towards Mecca. The Jewish soldiers are commemorated on a wall nearby. There’s no prejudice here - they all ended up dead, no matter what religion or nationality.

And there’s the bayonet trench where you can still see the bayonet tips and rifle butts protruding through the soil where a detachment of infantry was buried alive by a mortar attack. More immediate than the horror of all those bones piled up in the ossuary when you realise that the bodies of those men are still buried under the soil, it’s possibly the saddest sight I have seen.

And there are so many more stories, so many it’s impossible to comprehend or even imagine. Half a million men died in the battle of Verdun, half a million fathers, sons, brothers, husbands, lovers. When I was confronted with all that, I had no choice but to change my mind.

Not about the futility of war, not about the poppy-wearing flag-waving thugs on the political far right. But now I don’t think about that when I see the poppies worn on lapels in supermarket car parks. I think about all those souls piled up in ossuaries, buried alive in trenches, or in the cemeteries of Verdun and Ypres. War is stupid - all it leads to is killing. But for the men who had no choice but to fight, or those who believed it was right, they all risked their lives and we need to remember that.

But though I had changed my mind I wasn’t ready to buy a poppy and wear it with pride, until Wednesday when I was having lunch in my local cafe. It’s a small town and everyone knows each other so I wasn’t surprised when two elderly men walked in, and stopped to chat with a pair of ladies who were enjoying a hot meal and a strong cup of tea. When they’d finished and were ready to leave, one of the ladies stood up and addressed the customers.

“These two gentlemen have been outside Morrisons’ supermarket selling poppies all morning and I think they deserve a round of applause.” They got it, but that wasn’t the end of it. One of the men at the next table started chatting to them, making no bones about showing his appreciation, especially when the old gentlemen said, quite modestly, “I’m ninety, and he’s ninety one.” Ninety years. Soon there will be no one left who remembers what it was really like, but these men were still doing their best to ensure the memory lives on in our minds.

So I went to the supermarket on Saturday and quietly, without a fuss, I did something I never thought I would do - I bought a poppy and pinned it to my lapel.