It was a long day. I can't believe how much we squeezed into it. To crown it, we decided to watch the bonfire night display in Glasgow Green tonight. Every year, for the past 30 years, Glasgow puts on a massive firework display, complete with fairground, food and merchandising, all in the city's most famous park, Glasgow Green. The Green has always been a place for the people, and it's great to see this tradition at least carry on into the annual event that is Guy Fawkes Day (incidentally, nobody calls it thus around here, maybe because the Scots wouldn't have minded so much if he had indeed blown up the Houses of Parliament? Who knows).
Cubling was excited. She wanted to go to "Firelands" as she called it. She loved crossing the bridge, commented on very many people and very little space. She delighted in the fairground rides and oh, the chips with cheese went down a real treat.
Then the fireworks started. What can I say? The photos I took of her show eyes filled with terror, with the neverending intonation of "I want go in my house, I like it not!" We managed to make her get through it with lots of reassurance, cuddles, suggestions of closing her eyes or looking another way, naming the colours of the fireworks. She did it, got through it at least without further tears, and the fairground rides definitely made her forget those very noisy, very bright, very funny (read: scary) fireworks.
But more than anything else, it was beautiful. There are days where I can't believe how lucky we are to live in this fabulous city. Today was one of them.
