An earthquake shook Dumfries this morning . I didn't notice; I was in Next for the sale, and the room was already reverberating with bargain-hunters elbowing each other in the face. That doesn't say much for my powers of perception: 3.5 on the Richter scale and I'm distracted by a couple of middle-aged women wrestling over a half-price sweater.

It's appropriate that 2006 is ending with a bang, since it began for me with a whimper. I saw in the previous new year in on my parents' front room, the entertainment provided by The Big Lebowski on DVD and a lone dram of single malt. Just weeks after my operation, I was grateful above all else to be alive. But I vowed to myself that my next Hogmanay would include the elements that were missing from the occasion: the ability to function socially, the presence of people my own age, that kind of thing.

After 2005's moments of high drama - being told I had the tumour, the op itself - 2006 was, by contrast, notable chiefly for its mundanity. I began it taking life at the slowest possible pace, walking with a crutch, still slightly spaced out from the drugs and having had my brain fiddled with. I marked my progress via incidents that would normally have been routine: going for a pint, taking the train, being able to drive again. Each of them remarkable only because they marked "the first time since..." None of these events, by themselves, gave any indication that I had reached any particular stage of recovery. Yet by the summer, I found myself by most measures recovered: my balance restored, my thought process functioning and so on. Try as I did to record the build-up to this, it still caught me by surprise. There was never any fanfare. No-one jumped out of a cake to tell me, "You're well again." It just sort of crept up on me.

There were setbacks, of course, but none of them were particularly debilitating. The ulcer on my cornea did threaten to cost me my right eye, and looking back through my blog I realise this was the one point that I found myself succumbing to self-pity. But even then, what got to me (as when I found myself drowning in the bureaucracy of incapacity benefit) was not pain or discomfort but boredom. The physical demands of my experience were never all that great, to be honest. What I did find depressing - and I count my blessings that this was as bad as it got - was sitting in endless waiting rooms, at the mercy of other people's timetables. Brain tumours are not for people, like me, with short attention spans.

But the rest of 2006, my low-key year, was pretty enjoyable. I read a lot of books and got into a lot of new music. In the process of aiding my recovery I got myself fit and started running and cycling (annoyingly, I haven't been for a jog since I pulled a calf muscle three weeks ago, but I'm determined to keep this up). I enjoyed the sunshine during the long, hot summer, explored the countryside and watched every game in the World Cup. I know I'm not supposed to admit this, given that the appeal of sick-lit depends on pathos and confronting adversity. But I thoroughly enjoyed myself. Given the choice, I would do it all again.

I won't bore you all again with my views about how refreshing it all was to come off the career treadmill, because you've heard it from me before. And I continue to add the disclaimer that isolation from friends, the interruption of having any responsibility and purpose in life, are only things I could shrug off because I knew they were temporary. But the theme I've kept returning to in this diary is the idea that we only come by this realisation of truth, this knowledge of one's self, when we step outside our lives. Since the vast majority of us have neither the time nor the resources nor the inclination to do this, it takes a major setback before we are in a position to achieve this. That's why I thoroughly recommend going down with a brain tumour. It's just a question of learning to embrace the experience.

My story isn't finished, of course. There are still things that can be done to compensate for my defunct right ear. And though my facial palsy has made a partial recovery - I'm not drooping anything like I did at the start of the year - I look forward to offering photographic evidence that I look, to all intents and purposes, normal. But in light of everything that's gone before, I'm not expecting any kind of overnight revolution. Slow and steady has worked well for me up until now.

With the help of some people who know who they are, I've made sure that my resolution for 2006 will be realised. I'll be seeing in the bells this Sunday night in a cottage in the west country, getting legless with some old friends. Much as I'm grateful to my parents for all they've done for me, I'm sure they will be as relieved as I am that I won't be in their company on this occasion.

I can feel it, 2007 is going to be my year. I have news that confirms this. But I'll let you know all about it once we're onto the new calendar. Everyone's had enough earthquakes for the time being.