I had my first ever piano lesson this week. And since then I have spent the entire time trying to think of how to use this as a clever metaphor for something. Maybe for trying to expand when the world is pressing us inwards, maybe. I can see that one.

But then there’s also this. My piano teacher — it is very strange saying that to you, er, especially as at time of writing I haven’t heard whether she’s agreed to take me on following that trial lesson — where was I? Thanks. My piano teacher lives ludicrously close to me and while I’ve never been down her road before, I have driven by it and parallel to it perhaps a good hundred thousand times or more.

On Tuesday night, I parked on a spot I knew from these drives and walked on up toward hers. It was very cold, she lived much further up the road than my map was trying to tell me, and for a night that was supposed to be about music, it was shockingly quiet. At one high spot on this road, I stood for a moment looking back from this strange perspective out across roads and houses and shops that I know fantastically well — from other angles.

It was like seeing all of them for the first time. The difference in perspective was two metres, maybe three at a push. Every single thing I could see was already known to me. But now every single thing was fresh and new too.

I did stay staring for too long and then had to rush to get to the lesson. And there of course there was another perspective shift as there is a decent chance I’ve spent a million hours at keyboards in my writing life, but here was a totally new one.

No metaphors, just a better world for looking around and doing something new.