When I was in Universty in England, there was a painting along one of the English Lit. corridors called ‘Hiraeth’. I know the feeling.

It was all reds and greens and heart-saturated blues.

Hiraeth is looking out across the chimney pots, the sloping slanty rooftops, and wondering where all the mountains are because that’s not a view, it’s just a smoggy horizon.

Hiraeth is having to go to the park every time you can because you so miss the earth, and not understanding why there is a need to go to a park at all. Why do these people keep their greenery fenced in little boxes? 

Hiraeth is having to wonder where to walk the dogs because you actually have to find places to walk the dogs. You don’t just go out of the door into country.

Hiraeth is wondering where the villages went. Where generations grew up together and it would have been an insult to lock your doors. 

Hiraeth can’t be diretly translated into English but it means a longing for Wales.

This is the view over the Severn Bridge into Wales. 

This means coming home.