The sun shall be turned into darkness, and the moon into blood (Joel 2.31).

3.00 am. The alchemical mutation of the super moon eclipse, which glowed like a heated coppery orb, miraculously suspended. My visual memory, rather than my failed, hand-held photographs, will be the most abiding and affecting image of the phenomenon. I probably won’t be on this side of the veil the next time it occurs:

8.15 am. A time of reflection upon my obligations before a very down-to-earth nose dive into various administrations of a modular, personal, pastoral, and researchable kind. Oiling the bike isn’t half as fulfilling as riding it; but without lubrication, it doesn’t travel half so smoothly. So, I pressed on with organising times for tutorials, group meetings, trips, files and folders, backups, updates, the mechanics of delivery, course materials, and priorities. It all came fast and furious.

1.00 pm. Off to School to prepare for the first Abstraction lecture at 2.10 pm. Two more lights in the darkness:

It takes time for the deliverer and recipients to get into the groove and sync after so many months of not assuming those roles. The level of general religious knowledge among students (and that of the general populous, it must be said) is at a very low ebb — medieval, almost. One should assume nothing these days, and explain everything. All knowledge (including the religious sort) and disciplines pass through art history; that’s one of the discipline’s glories. The subject touches all things, and demands that the scholar gain some understanding of most things. Big ask!

3.15 pm. A walkaround with Mr Garrett in order to allocate studio spaces to the new MA contingent:

3.45 pm. The entrance of light. And with it, one anticipates, wisdom, hope, mercy, grace, and compassion:

For the remainder of the afternoon, I concerned myself with apportioning MA students to staff and spaces. My room is baked by the sunlight and a radiator that (like the sun) cannot be turned off. The first year students are bedding-in (if in the wrong rooms, on occasion).

6.30 pm. Practise session 1 . 7.30 pm. And in the heavens, again, at the close of the day: a Friedrichy sunset over the Buarth:

An evening of uploading files to Blackboard, completing registers, posting curriculum and guidelines, and keeping everyone in the loop. 9.00 pm. Facebook appears to have been stymied (by the super moon eclipse, no doubt); social networkers are in meltdown; and kitten and puppy addicts are having to go cold turkey. Ha!