Married with 3 amazing children, living in the beautiful Peak District. A crazy life of fairytales, nature, art and books. All views my own.
Buxton
Joined June 2009
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Emma Manchester retweeted
The UK Covid-19 Inquiry published its report into care today.
Our loved ones were failed by a Government that abandoned them and left them to die. Action must be taken now to prevent a tragedy like this happening again.
Here is our statement:
Love it. Bless his heart he’s got a great future ahead of him I bet!
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Emma Manchester retweeted
2 years ago, I found the saddest cat in the shelter and took him home.
Last year, he raised $10k for that same shelter by starring in his own calendar.
This year, we're going to do even better.
Happy gotcha day, Gregory.
Preorders now available: cosmicbackground.io/products…
Emma Manchester retweeted
If you want to know what masking diligently in 2026 is really like.
It’s not a cute selfie for X.
It’s lines in the face, a nose rubbed raw, chapped lips and a tired soul that tells a story of isolation spanning nearly seven years. Its thoughts about my now dead friends and the pain my living ones endure. It a burden that pales mostly in comparison to the unthinkable alternative. Losing what little I’ve gotten back.
It’s the judging looks from strangers and the distance it creates. It’s not eating in a restaurant, or having a beer at your favorite pub. Or coffee in a cafe. It’s not hanging out and smiling with friends.
It’s not a choice. It’s not a virtue signaling game on social media or a cheap avatar. It’s not a competition. It’s not a gotcha moment for those who continue to deny covid can maim and that #LongCovid can kill.
It’s your loved one’s missing you while you do everything you can to protect yourself. A simple matter of survival and and a hellish prison cell all wrapped into one.
But I know a secret.
I know what you don’t.
I know what it’s like to be not only healthy, but to be sick. I know what both worlds hold.
Do you?
I know what it’s like to realize that all along, all the things that came so easy and felt mundane were actually gifts taken for granted at the time.
There are no promises that what you have today will be here tomorrow.
I bet you think you know that. I use to to tell myself that I knew it too. I think it’s normal to assume “you get it”
But if you haven’t experienced real loss the way others like myself have, you simply don’t. I promise you that.
And if you haven’t had everything stolen by covid, you could not possibly understand the respect and concern it demands.
I have no reason to post this pic and put myself out there for the trolls other than to let it serve as a reminder that I am a real person. A person who’s actually suffered for years because of this. I actually live this way on 2026 and it’s not a game.
Now, truth be told I’ve come a long way. I’ve had to relearn how to walk, to cook, to drive, to talk clearly and all the things that you probably never think about.
Things you take for granted.
And I plan on continuing to get better until one day I’m able to do many of the things I use to love and reclaim the joys that were stolen from me.
But all of that is contingent on my health. And since the only thing that prevented me from being reinfected is a mask, it’s something that haunts my daily routine.
There are sadly no keys to unlock the prison doors. At least not for many of us with #LongCovid.
Emma Manchester retweeted
I saw this post and wanted to address it.
If you look at social media today, you’ll see good, empathetic people admitting they are losing hope. They look at climate change, rising authoritarianism, and corporate greed and feel entirely powerless. If you feel this way, I want
ALT hate to broadcast this on social media, but I know l am not alone when I candidly state that l am losing the will to live. In my 53 years, I have never known a time when I could not locate a semblance of hope until now. It's only a feeling, but an uncomfortable one, one that makes me feel powerless. The future of the planet, genocide, the threat of being ruled and surveilled by tech overlords, the corruption, amorality, the lack of empathy, fascism on the rise globally w/GOP in support.
Emma Manchester retweeted
I really need to address what has happened here, because it demonstrates exactly what disabled people are up against.
A highly paid presenter, fronting a programme that carries his own name, was challenged by a community over rhetoric we believed was dangerous and harmful. Disabled people, sick people and carers held his feet to the fire and asked for accountability.
And somehow, that has now been turned back on the very community that challenged it.
That imbalance of power matters.
This is what disabled people are dealing with every single day: rhetoric about benefits, sickness and disability being repeated by people with enormous platforms, while the people directly affected are expected to absorb the consequences, and then face criticism when we challenge it.
And this is exactly why I started my petition.
Before launching it, I went back and looked at how often benefits and sickness had been discussed on the programme since the beginning of the year. What I found shocked me: it was being raised virtually every day, and on some days more than once.
That is not an occasional discussion about welfare policy. It creates a narrative. And when that narrative repeatedly focuses attention on sick and disabled people, we have every right to question the impact it has.
This was never about attacking one presenter. It was about challenging a much bigger problem: the way disabled people are talked about in public life, the language that is normalised, and the consequences that can follow.
When a community without anything like the same media power speaks up and holds powerful people accountable, the answer cannot be to make that community the problem.
That is precisely why this petition matters.
petition.parliament.uk/petit…
Gorgeous photo of the Minster. My father worked on the long West windows just above the door restoring them after the fire. We were all so very proud of him. He died in 2002 and there is no mention of his work in the Minster but the windows are an enduring testament.
York Minster was built over 500 years ago.
Its Gothic heart rose over more than 250 years from the early 13th century through to 1472 crafted by generations of medieval masons and carpenters working with hand tools, ropes, and sheer vision.
Yet, today, with every advantage imaginable we rarely create anything that comes close in scale, beauty or enduring spirit.
Emma Manchester retweeted
A.A. Milne with some delightful words...
Nowhere can I think so happily as in a train. I am not inspired; nothing so uncomfortable as that. I am never seized with a sudden idea for a masterpiece, nor form a sudden plan for some new enterprise. My thoughts are just pleasantly reflective. I think of all the good deeds I have done, and (when these give out) of all the good deeds I am going to do. I look out of the window and say lazily to myself, “How jolly to live there”; and a little farther on, “How jolly not to live there.” I see a cow, and I wonder what it is like to be a cow, and I wonder whether the cow wonders what it is to be like me; and perhaps, by this time, we have passed on to a sheep, and I wonder if it is more fun being a sheep. My mind wanders on in a way which would annoy Pelman a good deal, but it wanders on quite happily, and the “clankety-clank” of the train adds a very soothing accompaniment. So soothing, indeed, that at any moment I can close my eyes and pass into a pleasant state of sleep.
🎨 Eric Ravilious (1939)
Emma Manchester retweeted
Every so often I see a post from someone that didn't find an eclipse an incredible experience. They didn't seem to get the hype.
The sun turned into a black ball with glowing plasma shooting off of it. If that doesn't get you to feel something, nothing will 😆
Emma Manchester retweeted
And as John O'Donohue once wrote...
"The beauty that emerges from woundedness is a beauty infused with feeling; a beauty different from the beauty of landscape and the cold perfect form. This is a beauty that has suffered its way through the ache of desolation until the words or music emerged to equal the hunger and desperation at its heart. It must also be said that not all woundedness succeeds in finding its way through to beauty of form. Most woundedness remains hidden, lost inside forgotten silence. Indeed, in every life there is some wound that continues to weep secretly, even after years of attempted healing. Where woundedness can be refined into beauty a wonderful transfiguration takes place."
Emma Manchester retweeted
“We shall not cease from exploration, and the end of all our exploring will be to arrive where we started and know the place for the first time.” 🧭
- T. S. Elliot
#exploration #adventure #travel
Emma Manchester retweeted
The principles behind the Mayor’s clean & healthy waterways plan are laudable, but the specifics on implantation & delivery are sorely lacking, as is sufficient funding to make it happen. Unless the plan is significantly amended, in 10 years time London’s waterways will still be a polluted mess.
Much of the funding is just re-stating funding already committed (eg the money that Thames Water is obliged to spend fixing illegal sewage outlets). The obligations are all on third party organisations (from the Environment Agency to Thames Water, to big charities) to deliver, big with no explanation of why these organisations who have failed to protect our rivers for decades will suddenly do what is needed to carry out major restoration.
Perhaps most shockingly, the Mayor did not consult a single grassroots river guardian group. These are the groups on every river in London who know their river better anyone else & who are putting in the hard graft to protect it against all the odds. In the River Roding, I could give the Mayor a clear & detailed plan of what needs to be done, & how we can do it, to restore the river for nature and make it swimmable within 10 years. Quite simply, without the input of river guardians, I believe that this plan quite simply cannot be delivered.
So we ask this of @MayorofLondon: call in guardians from every river in London to City Hall, listen to what they say needs doing, update your report, & then support the guardians to make this change happen. Together, we can protect & restore our rivers.
Emma Manchester retweeted
I had 3-4 weeks off Twitter with autistic burnout recently & my engagement is right down (also due to standing up to a vile group of trolls on here-they reported me lots, restricting my reach). If you see this photo it would be so ace if you could RT it or drop me a quick hello if you have a moment, both of which help an account get back on track. I also hope these little violas ping some floral dopamine in your meat computer & give you a small lift 🌿
Don’t worry they told us. We’ll protect you clinically vulnerable. Well this is how it’s going for us.
I have been hoping and waiting for this for a long old time. Everyone needs the genius of Hookland in their lives. Please support this wonderful author.
Emma Manchester retweeted
Except @EnvAgency has not prosecuted a single litterer on my river, even where it’s obvious who has done it (eg a household dumping waste over their fence). The EA has also ignored serious waste crime: eg a landowner who dumped 10,000 tonnes of building waste into the river, & a huge illegal landfill site (bigger than Kidlington) beside the river near Epping, which they are planning to leave there to rot.
They decided instead that the best use of their resources was to investigate & threaten to prosecute me & other volunteers for removing rubbish from the river & give me a warning not to do it again. Can you call in the EA chief exec & demand that they concentrate their resources on stopping the serious waste crimes that the public clearly wants them to concentrate on rather than hassling local volunteers?
