Feeling the Love

First of all I have to say a huge thank you to the lovely Lady Mel. I received a lovely letter in the post along with a very lovely picture and a very lovely and apt pressie to pass on to a special young lady. Thank you Hun! You have a wee habit of lifting my spirits at the right time in unexpected ways... XXX

***

Then we have the saga of the socks.

TAW Week 7 has an exercise to buy a little luxury for yourself. It suggests a lovely pair of gloves or socks. Socks resonated with me instantly. My socks cause my ankles to swell, they bite to hard. A couple of years back I was with my folks at Christmas and my Mum, Dad and Sister received a present from a family friend. I didn't. OK so I wasn't overly close to this person and I hadn't given them a pressie.

I was very jealous of the socks my Dad got though. They were hand knitted. No seams. No nasty biting elastic at the top. Not quite my colour, being manly and all, but a lovely variegated wool had been used.

I must admit after that I started making her a little something for Xmas. I must admit though, I was kind of hoping I might get a pair of socks though. It didn't work because she got very busy at work and I got some nice handmade bath things instead. They were lovely, but I did really covet those socks.

So, the suggestion of treating myself to a luxurious socks kind of bought an image into my head. Beautiful variegated purple wooly socks. The sort that you darn when they get holes.

I tried hunting for local knitters but sometimes the internet makes such things tricky. It is far easier to find companies than it is to find lone artisans for hire. I pondered how to find such people and etsy sprang to mind. I have never used etsy before...

I searched for local etsy sellers and while there was some beautiful things and talented artisans, none of them were knitters or crocheters. So I started looking a little more broadly and I looked at lots and lots of socks. And of course slipper socks and sock slippers. Crocheted mary janes. Lace up crochet socks. Felted boot socks. So much variety. But not so many variegated purple sock.

I did eventually find a pair.

I fell in love.

I contacted the seller regarding sizing and established that they would fit.

I tried to buy.

I failed to buy.

Her shop didn't include shipping outside the grand old US of A. Which isn't where I live.

I contacted her and asked her if I could get them here or if they could maybe go to a friend in Canada....

She added the UK to her postal list. And Canada.

I purchased socks! And they are on their way.

***

I wrote a wishlist a little while back for another TAW exercise and I posted it on my blog.

I have a lovely friend who reads my blog, although she doesn't have one of her own and comments via email. We met once, years ago. A friend of a friend. Somehow we got chatting via Facebook and then became Facebook friends and then email friends and soon, we shall also be face to face friends. For she is visiting Cornwall....

It is a slightly odd thing, remeeting someone in this sort of a way. We know each other so well in some ways. But I just know it will all be fine. We connected because we have similar interests and values. It will not be like the recent visit of an old friend I used to be very close to, who has chosen a radically different path in life to me. We have similar religous paths and have spoken in depth of things that I know I seldom share with people I know in the flesh.

OK so the reason this all fits in this post is that when she comes down, she is bringing a gift. One listed in my wishlist. She happened to know of an artisan making such things, in a truly beautiful fashion. She saw one that spoke to her of me. She then gave me a choice. I could have chosen any of them, but I want the one that spoke to her. So I have a surprise coming my way, which even though it will be beautiful, will be all the more special for having been chosen for me by a friend.

***

So i guess it is fairly obvious what the theme of this post is. Presents and the art of giving. The best presents are those given freely, with no strings, no expectations. Where the person giving has taken the care to personally choose or make something that they thing the recipient will like. That care and attention is the thing that makes a present special.

Giving with the expectation of receiving something in return is likely to lead to disappointment. You are unlikely to get what you want. Even if you get something truly lovely, it will not be the thing you coveted. The expectation of receiving something ruins the gift of receiving care and attention from the giver. Giving from obligation feels empty in many ways. As does receiving a present given from obligation.

If there is something you truly covet, value yourself enough to give yourself that something as a no strings attached gift. That is not to say you should go and buy yourself hugely outrageous and epensive things. A true gift is made more valuable by care and attention. Notice that little thing you covet and give yourself the gift of getting it, of caring enough about yourself to allow yourself to have it. A pair of socks really isn't a big thing is it? But yet it is....

I believe the care and attention I put into the hand made gifts I make for my family increases their value. I personally select what to make. The colours, style, everything. I don't like all the things I make as gifts, some I adore and have trouble parting with. It doesn't matter, it isn't about me. I get so much from that giving. I get something everytime I get to see them wear it. I get something everytime they tell me of another compliment they receive for it. Little gifts that come back to me unexpectedly.

Gifts do not have to be big to have a huge effect. In fact I think the little things often have the biggest impact and meaning. Thought counts more than showy consumerism in my book. Thought equals love while flashy consumerism equals money.

So thank you to all those lovely people who have given me gifts because they thought I might like it, or just wanted to give me something. Thank you to those who signed up for swaps with me and made something so perfectly designed and created for me. Just thank you. I can feel your love.

This all ended up a bit long.... But I guess what I am saying is that we should all look for the little gifts in our lives. Gifts of spirit. A rowan branch. A beautiful sunny day. A glimpse of the moon in a break in the clouds.

TAW Week 7

Time to step on a week but first I want to make a short review as this is the halfway point in my slow meander through this book...

Since starting this book my life has altered. It has stepped forward and I have learnt things. I don't think I would have learnt quite the same things, or as quickly if I hadn't been following this book. While I am not to hot on my artist's dates, I have had a few and will continue to do them. I don't really do the morning pages but I have come to see that this blog performs much of the same function. Not always as clearly but it does do it.

Each week has exercises and activities and my reaction to these is varied. Week Five was interesting. Looking back on the things I wrote is always interesting too. I have bought a warm winter coat - not waterproof but nice, warm, stylish and it fits. There is even room because of the style to wear extra things underneath. I wished to never feel cold, to have a faster metabolism and better circulation. And what do you know? *grin* I also know that one wish is going to be fulfilled soon by a rather lovely friend. I am contemplating making stars to hang from my ceiling above my creative table tomorrow. I am more joyful and more happy now I feel I have a bit more energy. My bed is warm and snuggly and that little bit of weight seems to have made a difference to how I sleep in it. I am not so uncomfortable so maybe I don't need a new mattress. So of my 16 wishes, 6 have come true in some way and 2 are in progress. Leaving 8 unfulfilled. So far. I have the rest of my life....

Maybe this was the lesson of Week 6. I didn't like week 6. There wasn't enough writing. There was too much stuff I didn't want to do. Why would I want to pick up yet more stones to go in my house? I have so many bits picked up on walks... Instead I got the raw materials for a wand and staff. I have cleared my wardrobes and put lots of things in bags to go although they havn't gone very far yet. I don't bake but I do cook and I made a whole pot full of root veg soup spiced with pepper, fennel seed and smoked paprika. So things have happened but they are harder to quantify than written exercises....

So here we are at week 7.

Jealousy and perfectionism....

Jealousy Map

F has more money than me help him spend it (*laugh* I hope he reads this!)
F enjoys his job more than I do mine get better at enjoying mine, learn to stress a little less.
LP everyone likes her even though she is vapid and not of much use appreciate my own worth more and understand that much of it is about youth and beauty in a place full of men (most old enough to be her Dad)
Sister For living closer to our parents make them all move down here


OK. I am finding it hard to do this one seriously. I am not someone who feels jealousy very strongly. I might desire things for myself but I don't tend to desire the taking away of them from others and this is what jealousy is. I want it so you can't have it, not I want it as well.

Archaeology
As a kid, I missed the chance to play sports. (I suffered from rheumatism due to my knee joints getting cold while wearing stupid gym skirts in all weathers. If they had let me keep my knees warm by wearing tracksuit bottoms then all would have been much better)
As a kid, I lacked support. ( I was a little misunderstood, tomboy geek in a girls school)
As a kid, I could have used a friend.
As a kid, I dreamed of being a Vet.
As a kid, I wanted a horse.
In my house, we never had enough books. ( There was loads, but you can never, ever have enough)
As a kid, I needed more fun.
I am sorry that I will never again see *** (a friend of my parents who died of breast cancer when I was 16. I loved her and her husband. He becmae a different person without her and we lost him to)
For years, I have missed and wondered about my Grandfathers (both dead before my parents even met)
I beat myself up about the loss of my virginity (*blush* do I?)
I have a loyal friend in F.
One thing I like about my town is all the beautiful, solid granite.
I think I have nice friends.
Writing my morning pages has shown me that I can deal with any ghosts from my past.
I am taking a greater interest in losing weight.
I believe I am getting better at being happy.
My artist has started to pay more attention to light.
My self-care is a lovely long bath with a beautiful bath product and a good book.
I feel more energetic.
Possibly my creativity is a little tired. (It has had a bit of blossoming and it had to pause for a little bit to take breath but it is there waiting...)

Again the exercises are a bit on the doing side rather than writing but they appeal a bit more than last weeks. I like this week better. I love the idea of buying a lovely pair of socks. Handknitted in a lovely colour, maybe lots of colours. With no elastic at the top to make nasty marks when my legs swell. A pair of socks to keep my feet warm in my boots this winter. A pair of socks to slouch around the house in....

I can do the smell.... I can go to a sacred space and breath in the solitude and sounds..... I can write out 'Treating myself like a precious object will make me strong' and make it all pretty.... I certainly managed to wear my lovely new (and slightly expensive) troll bracelet round the house today. Did I mention how close I came to not 'wasting' money on it? But my folks gave me some cash to buys omething nice for my birthday and the extra I put towards it didn't take so much courage.... I can listen to music and doodle....

So all good really....

Week 6

Money Madness
People with money are lucky
Money makes people lazy
I'd have more money if I won the lottery
My dad thought money was precious
My mum thought money was easily spent
In my family, money caused secrets
Money equals fame
If I had money I'd travel
If I could afford it, I'd buy some land
If I had some money, I'd learn lots of crafts
I'm afraid that if I had money I would never leave my house
Money is evil
Money causes unhappiness
Having money is not selfless
In order to have more money, I'd need to be career motivated
When I have money, I usually spend it
I think money can bring happiness
If I weren't so cheap I'd do up my house
People think money is evil
Being broke tells me I should look at my bank balance more before spending

I don't like this week. There are no easy written exercises. No thinky things. Just doing things. I havn't done my morning pages much recently either. Do I really believe I can be prosperous? I don't think I do. Not every day for sure.

Clearing out is something we have planned anyway... F and I have decided as we are both off work this week that we should gather things for a car boot. I am always picking up pebbles at the beach... Now I need to pick and dry flowers. Say yes to freebies? What freebies - I havn't noticed any - does that mean I didn't notice or that there weren't any?

hmmmm

Wishful Thinking

I have dreams, just like most people. A couple of days ago, i found the embodiment of those dreams. 42 acres, with 6 of woodland, 32 of fields, a couple of gardens and the rest of sundry areas including a nice long private drive. A beautiful old house with bags of charm and character. A barn converted into three letting cottages, another barn, a garage and an external study. With a river running through and plenty of watery-ness. Perfect.

So in the interests of manifestation I have decided to spend a lot of time picturing myself living there. Manifestation is a big topic in the Artist's Way for this week. Putting your dreams out there and allowing the universe to fulfil them is what it's all about. Now I would love to see the universe give me the means to buy a mini-estate with a value of over a million pounds, but short of freak accidents to everyone I am related to or the lottery jackpot coming my way, I can't see it happening. Losing my family would be too high a price to pay for any dream. At the root of this dream is the desire for place and family afterall.... And with a family like mine I already have so much to be grateful for.

So I have a dull job that I can do and let my brain take me off to other places. This week I have been living on the estate and to be honest, I have really, really enjoyed it. I am not finding it easy picturing everyday like, mostly because I don't know whether we would be working, or me at home with a fledgling brood or what. I picture walking with Little Dog through the woods and to the river. I picture vague shadows of other unknown dogs cavorting around but I don't know them, how they would come to us or when and I certainly have no fixed ideas of what they might look like.

To be honest, what I seem to be spending most time on is my wedding. Or rather the party to be held afterwards on my mini-estate. The complex details of families and festivities have sucked me in. I have struggled with the idea of a venue for my wedding and suddenly, here it is.

Now you might think I am getting my hopes up about nothing and to be honest, maybe I am, at least a part of me is. The rest of me however has discovered that dwelling in this lovely dream is a beautiful place to take my mind away from the dullness of work. I feel happy. I have spent the the last couple of days in the place of my dreams and no one can take that away from me. Fancy joining me tomorrow?

TAW Week Five

Time for another TAW session! I am sure you all enjoy reading these *laugh*

The Virtue Trap Quiz
The biggest lack in my life is fitness
The greatest joy in my life is F
My largest time commitment is work
As I play more, I work less
I feel guilty that I am fat
I worry that I will never realise my dreams
If my dreams come true, my family would celebrate
I sabotage myself so people will feel comfortable and less threatened by me
If I let myself feel it, I'm angry that I have no career
One reason I get sad sometimes is boredom

It seems my life doesn't actually serve anyone....

Forbidden Joys
Beautiful clothes that fit!
Horse riding
Walking long distances
A good warm and waterproof outdoor coat
A pair of fur lined boots from the Celtic Sheepskin Company
Doing a jigsaw
Live on a large plot of land with a stream or river, woods, fields for animals, room for gardens and food growing and a forest garden, with a beautiful old or eco home.
Take a Tai chi class
Become confident at sewing
Make a rug

Wish List
I wish for joy and bountiful happiness
I wish for stars to dangle from my ceiling
I wish for a warm and snuggly bed
I wish for a new mattress
I wish for a newspaper sanded floor
I wish for another dog
I wish for children
I wish to have no need to 'work' in a dull job
I wish for butterflies to hang from my plants
I wish for a green man face for my garden
I wish for a door from my lounge into my garden
I wish for more light in my house
I wish to never feel cold
I wish for better circulation
I wish for a quicker metabolism
I wish for dragons

I guess if I had to list my desires, most of them, the deepest ones, centre around where I would like to live. I want land. I want to grow my own food. I want to have sheep and goats and pigs and maybe a cow or two along with some horses and chickens. I want a forest garden. I want a wood with bluebells. I want some wild boggy land and a river and a pond. I want a home, either an old on or one I have designed and built myself. I want a home for the family I want to have. I found the perfect place online last night for the bargain price of £1,250,000... 42 acres with 6 acres of wood and a river, a lovely old stone house, three letting cottages converted from an old barn, a barn, an external study and a lovely long private drive..... I want it!

Five Imaginary Lives
Trapeze Artist (? *laugh*)
Farrier
Crane Driver
Mother
Vet
All a bit random really, except the links to animals and the wanting to be a Mother....

If I were twenty and had money....
At 20 I didn't want children, I wasn't ready and it wasn't anywhere near time. So my wishes for me back then are so different for what I would wish for me now...

I would travel and have adventures. Dive the Great Barrier Reef. Climb Uluru. Go to Borneo and travel up river to visit indigenous folk. Explore cave systems in the middle of rainforests. Walk the great wall of China. Travel across the Mongolian desert. Visit exotic ruins in Egypt by moonlight. Stay in a cliff house. Visit Machu Picchu. Fly over the Atacama desert. Travel around the Grand Canyon everyway i can. Ride horses on a ranch. Go white water rafting. Watch crocodiles in mangrove swamps. Glide down river at dusk watching fire flies. Visit the North Pole at the Summer Solstice. Cruise along the Nile. Climb Mount Kilamanjiro. These are the things I should have been doing at 20....

If I were 65 and had money...
My children would have left home and be exploring their dreams with our loving support and generous trust funds. Maybe one of them might have returned home, ready to settle and to begin, slowly taking over some of the land, maybe living in one of the holiday cottages. F and I would begin to holiday more. A little charity work maybe and a lot more crafts and maybe a few grandchildren.... A balanced life that reflects our bodies gently decreasing ability for hard labour...

Ten items I would like to own but don't
A good warm and waterproof outdoor coat.
sheepskin lined boots from the Celtic Sheepskin Company
A TV (arriving on Saturday! Yay!)
A leather corner sofa
Weebles ( a fantastic toy from my childhood...)
More music that I love from my teen days - particularly grunge and alternative rock
A wedding ring
A decent mattress, preferably memory foam
A SMART roadster (a sporty looking eco car)
A horse

On Being a Mother and Trying to Get a Life

Ok, so I am not really a Mother... but I did give birth to something this week and like any first time Mum I am there constantly checking and tweaking and looking... Enough said... I need to let it grow by itself a little. I just hope it does grow. I hope it doesn't turn into a nasty teenager and remains a nice dutiful, kind sort of a being.

Time to leave it be and not obsess...

I did my first vision board Thursday and I love it but I shan't post it because I ruthlessly borrowed images and feel I shouldn't repost them. The thing that came through is the phrase the root of me with the question what is the root of me? It has a celtic circular pattern, a moon over water, a spiral stone staircase, a brightly coloured duo of person and child, a man looking at a tree and a fantastic and strange planty sorty of a lady.... I just need to finish the lettering and stick it up by my shrine.

Last night we went out to see District 9 which is very good but I would hesitate to recommend. It is a sci-fi movie with aliens and gore and action but it is also a strong statement about the morals of people and the society we live in. Many who would like the moral story wouldn't like the gore and vice versa. It is a film I hope they don't make a sequel to. We then ate some lovely food and came home to bed and Little Dog.

This morning I have promised myself a trip to St Ives for my Artist's Date. I want to go and buy some beads and some more glue. I also want to go to the Barbara Hepworth Garden. I don't know how famous Barbara Hepworth was around the world but she was a fantastic sculptress who lived in St Ives. The garden to her old home is beautiful. It may be small but her understanding of space and shape allowed her to transform it and of course, to fill it with sculptures that sit well in their surroundings..... I love it there...

Being Me

So this is my first evening of no TV and no reading.... This is quite tricky and I have found myself being caught out a couple of times already!

F and I cooked a nice meal and then watched the end of a film on my laptop while eating. He then went of to do his thing, leaving me TV and book less. What to do?

I am in the process of a necklace at the moment for my niece but I can't carry on with it right now. I need some more glue, a special glue which can be precisely applied and is flexible once dry. I have some but the nozzle has come off making it hard to apply precisely, not that there is much left. The necklace is a celtic knotwork cross from a new book I have on ornamental knots for jewellery making (actually I have a series of three books and they are lovely). The knots are shown using braid rather than a string of beads. I have discovered the hard way that tigtehing these knots when tied with a string of seed beads is tricky... After several restarts I am going to try making and tigthening the knot in stags which will be far more complicated but at least I can glue and knot and then hide the knots.... So I am stuck on that.

Other current projects either involve going into my craft hole which is not a nice thought because it needs tidying or exercising skills I am not sure I have right now. I need to seal the edge of some cotton using embroidery thread to do something like they do for button holing. Not done it before though but must get on it....

So not feeling crafty and too stuffed and tired to do any thing strenuous...

I end up finding tunes on youtube and then I realise I have fallen into the reading trap as i am sat there reading about Kurt Cobain. Eek! What else to do.... I ended up making my first ever youtube playlist. So now I am sat here listening to it and enjoying it muchly!

I have found since I started doing TAW that I have realised I still have many of the same passions and tastes I did when i was younger.... This playlist is all grunge and alt rock mostly from about the time I did my A-levels (late teens). At that time I was a little goth chick with slight hippy and rock tendencies. So was my Sister.

When my family was down recently, I discovered my very young teen niece wants to go Goth. Having conversations about this with my Sis was amusing because my Sis doesn't want her to have black nail varnish... I don't see the harm but I am not in charge.

I decided to look up goth style and see if things had changed. They havn't really. There are new bands and things but it is still as I fondly rememebr it all. There is a newer cyber goth look which has apparently emerged from the crossover between goth and trance. It kind of hits me that i was there when that was happening, when it was all emerging. I was part of that. And I still love it all.....

i no longer have the desire to go clubbing in quite such exhibitionist clothing but I like the goth look and I still love that whole scene and a bit of grunge thrown in as well. I shan't be encouraging my niece to follow my wilder clothing ideas, for those she will have to wait till she has left home I expect, I know I did. But I can encourage her in other ways, I can help her express herself and her idea of style. I can look out my old goth posters including my lovely, lovely orginal poster from 'The Crow' and see if she wants them. I can look out some of my old accessories such as long gloves and black scarves and things and see if there is anything she fancies. This years pressies can have a black theme....

But what about me? How do I get where I want to be? Looking at the things I think would be fun (extreme and outdoor sports) as oppose to those i think are relaxing (crafts) I guess I really do need to lose weight. I can't start dressing like an 20 year old goth again, but I do need to find away to wear clothes I like rather than those the world seems to think plus size women should like. I can listen to the music I like more. Maybe if the TV isn't on then music can be. I so loved music, the first thing I would do when I woke up at that age was put some music on, closely followed by lighting up (I don not want that habit back!).

So I am going to clear out my wardrobe one night this week. I have it on my list of things to do anyway but it is a TAW exercise for this week. I have a wardrobe full of things I wore once I moved down to Cornwall and started to dessert my rock chick ways. They need to go. Even if I could fit into them, i don't want to wear them. My old tasseled tops and tie died shirts and long flouncy skirts are all long gone from years of wear. They have been replaced with casual office wear (ick) and jeans and t-shirts of no particular style...

I want me back.

Even better, F doesn't have any issues with the rumblings I am making. He seems quite happy to let me make cosmetic changes....

TAW Week Four

Buried Dreams

Five hobbies
rock climbing
caving
surfing
gliding
kite surfing

Five Classes
Clay sculpting
Sea kayaking
Drumming
Salsa dancing
Tai chi

Five fun things I would never do
Acting
Busking
Performance art
Tightrope walking
Juggling

Five fun skills
Scuba diving
Sailing
Carving
Singing
Guitar playing

Five Things I used to Enjoy
Horse riding
Badminton
Kayaking
Tai chi
Writing poetry

Five silly things I would like to try once
Sky Diving
Bungee jumping
Latex body painting (*laugh*)
Henna tattooing
Hot air ballooning

This is the week of reading deprivation and having had a weekend of book indulgence, well maybe it is a good time... Except that our old big TV recently died and got taken to the tip. We have been using our old portable. Last it blew up and made a nasty smell. So no reading our TV? eek! Can't help but feel fate is forcing my hand a little here.... To make it worse, F is doing lots of evenings this week...

My Ideal Environment
I love country and green and open spaces. I like techy things but not too obvious and in your face. I like well designed homes. I like windows that open both ways and heat exchange units which ensure you have constant fresh air without loosing heat. I like sustainable things such as walls using renewable materials like rendered straw. I like the handmade touch with sumptious fabrics, bright colours and interesting textures. I like a bit of funky stuff in there to, kitsch. Plants and views and open air but snug places too tucked away with a fire. I want lots of light. I want to be warm. I don't want other people, not part of my clan living on top of me. I like water and I find it soothing.

My Favourite Season
It is hard to choose between Spring and Autumn but I think I shall go with Autumn. Autumn is still fairly warm. I do not like extremes of temperature much. I love brisk walks on windy days on the beach. I love woods as they change colour. I love jumping in piles of leaves. I love it when Summer clings on a little and autumn is warm. I would rather have a wet Summer and a warm Autumn anytime... I love the harvest time. The inbetween time.

At 80
A trim, energetic lady who is often moving but still has an aura of peace and stillness. A Grandmother many times. A craftswoman. Someone with a wide range of interests and skills but who always has time to smell the roses and sit and watch the sky from her rocking chair on the deck. A person who nurtures and encourages those around her. Someone who always has something fun for the kids to do. Someone who always has several craft projects on the go, who has a house full of beautiful things made and collected. Someone who lived her life according to her values.

and the letter....

Dear Rose

Loose weight and have children. Not having more children sooner was always my biggest regret. I loved being a Mum and I love being a Grandmother to. Something frees you when you have others around and are the head of a clan. You spend too much time alone avoiding doing. Go do. Don't leave it too late so that you make your health bad. Go be an adrenalin junkie, you know you want! Stop making everything for others and make more for yourself too, you have a right to enjoy the fruits of your labours as well. Stop thinking about things all the time, just do, dance and listen to music more.... Know that you are loved, really, really know it and believe it.

At 8
I was into everything. Full of questions and life and spirit. I was the best tree climber. I spent a lot of time outdoors in my breaks at school, not always with others. Quite often not with others. I also liked books, even then and had begun reading voraciously. I knew no fear. I would have a go at anything. Pain didn't worry me. Fall off a horse? No problem.... I was helpful and keen, nothing was a problem. I drew horses a lot. I played patience. I watched old films with my sister because she didn't like to be alone. I never wanted a dull office job. I didn't want to work indoors. I laughed at the idea of having an office job.

Rose

What are you doing? get up early and go climg some trees, or some rocks or something and watch the sun rise. Go do a few things that could hurt but probably won't. Remember how it felt to push your body, to have a body you could use.... Quit that job and stop taking jobs in offices and get outdoors more. Where is your horse?

It seems that more of these tasks are about doing this week than just thinking and writing, so a few less nuggets for here. I consider my previous post to be one of these exercises in hindsight - that is definitely a situation I should have changed but havn't and I look at the payoffs as well....

Time Turns

Today is a quiet day (thankfully). It has all been good and fun and lovely but I am so tired now.

Today is a day off. Peace and quiet and catching up with myself.

Today is a mere breather because tomorrow I have committed to going to the races....

This week has made me realise that I use my blog sometimes to avoid doing things. Starting this blog has both opened my life up and closed it down. I spend too much time reading blogs. It isn't sustainable. It is an avoidance of doing.

I do think that sometimes I go a bit mad on crafting and wear myself out on it. The nice thing about beading is that it is a slow steady sort of a craft. Not likely to wear you out. I have started a bracelet for my Mum on my loom as we were talking about what she would like last weekend. It is in silver and grey and I am enjoying doing it.

This last ten days has been full. Over time at work. Flying around the country. Going to a wedding. Going shopping / browsing in an upmarket town with my parents. Intensive house cleansing. Walks with family to local places. A trip to St Ives by train to sit on the beach and wander round shops. A shopping trip with my sister. An outdoor production of Tartuffe (fantastically funny).

It was lovely but manic.

I also received a few early birthday pressies which I assisted in choosing... In my window is a lovely set of stained glass hearts in pink, red and purple strung downwards. I have a lovely blue glass with gold foil marble which sits on top of a bottle stopper. I have a set of brightly coloured silicon kitchen utensils. I have a lovely set of nesting kitchen things in all the colours of the rainbow including a bowl, colunder, sieve, measuring jug and measuring cups.

I think I may start posting a little less. Reading a few less blogs. Doing a little more. Time for a slightly different balance. Some things have been very much neglected. I want to spend more time on The Artists's Way. I want to finish Wreck This Journal. I am soon to start the Joy Diet. I want to make my house beautiful with objects I have made and altered. I want to finish my list of crafting obligations. I want to get started on my manic list for Christmas and the surrounding birthdays....

I will still be here but it has all been building and building and now it is time for those blossoms to bloom fully. Harvest is here. No doubt winter will see me brooding and returning more to this....

TAW Week Three Things

Time for some more TAW stuff....

Five childhood accomplishments:

• Won the Junior Reading Cup
• Won the Egg and Spoon Race at Primary School in Year 2! I was soooo proud!
• Won progress in gymnastics cup (mostly because I was so dire to begin with!)
• I was a Young Farmer (a country based youth organisation) and I won best junior at the county Rally
• I was the best tree climber

Five childhood favourite foods:

• Banana flavoured milupa (a brand of baby food). I so loved this and ate it long into my childhood.
• Turkey burgers
• Chocolate toothpaste (a chocolate tart we used to get at school)
• Flat yorkshires (drop scones my Mum makes and our nickname for them cos they were like flat yorkshire puddings) with melted butter.
• Chocolate spread on white crusty bread

Five things I liked about myself as a kid:

• I had soooo much energy! I slept as much as my Dad and he needed the least sleep of us all. I was awake with the first signs of the sun.
• I was so confident, I approached strangers and just took it for granted that they would want to talk to me.
• I had a lucky streak - my Dad would always get me to choose the raffle tickets and most raffles I would win something.
• I had an amazing imagination which came out in my stories, none of which I now remember but everybody says I had a good imagination and I loved writing.
• I had very little fear and I wasn't scared of being hurt. I rode a lot and didn't care about falling off...

Three obvious rotten habits:

• Overeating
• Sleeping too much
• Not exercising enough

Three subtle foes:

• Blogging! blogging is good but do you ever find yourself keep clicking on refresh to see if you have a new post to read or a comment or something! How to waste a lot of time pretending that you are doind something useful...
• Being logical - sometimes you just have to feel.
• Lack of money - I use this as an excuse a lot. I want to do some classes in september - Tai Chi and calligraphy but...

Five people I admire:

• My Boss - they never ever back away from a fight and are very, very good at standing up for others. Very assertive, they defend us all...
• My Mum - she is always there and always cares.
• Nicola Tustain - I once did an exercise to find a hero and I found this lady a paralympian dressage rider who is paralysed down one side of her body. What a woman...
• Dr House - OK so he isn't real but I love his genius, arsey, grumpiness
• My Nan - she has amazing green fingers. I want them!

Five people I secretly admire:

• Mel - *blush* she always has something cool to say and is always so 'there'
• Jordan - I can't bare her but I do secretly admire the way she just hangs it all out in public and just doesn't care.
• My cousin - he is so young but he is out there traveling the world
• The Little Princess - for being so determined about going her own way in the face of the combined advice of a lot of people and the combined disapproval of a whole bunch of them as well....
• Carla Calamity - the new £50,000 witch at Cheddar Gorge - she really is hanging her faith out there for all to see and she is already promoting all things witchy in a very positive way (so far!)

OK, so i need to be more arsey and assertive! I need to speak my mind and not care about what people think. I want green fingers and I want to travel.

Five dead people I would like to hang out with ( I did this once before on my blog but here are some different ones ):

• Einstein - I like science and this guy was just brilliant... His mind worked in a very unusual way...
• Da Vinci - what's not to admire here! art, science... I would love to spend some time ploughing through his ideas....
• Freddy Mercury - an amazing character, wouldn't he have some truly crazy stories to tell?
• Boo - she was a family friend who died of cancer when I was 16. She was a lovely warm person and was always one of my favourites. I would love to hang out with her.
• Cecil Williamson - an early witch who was friends with Crowley and Gardner, he pursued the folk side of it further and was much more interested in the more common and practical side of it all...

I like interesting people with fascinating minds or personalities. People who shine in some way from inside. I admire people who are tough and assertive but the people I like, I don't like for their assertiveness. I think assertiveness is something I feel I lack which is why I admire it in others.

Childhood Room

I had a lovely big room as a child with lots of light.

My parents have a long thin house with two staircases and two rooms upstairs are connected. My room was one of those so it had two ways in. It also had the door to the airing cupboard so when I was reading in my room I would often have my Mum come in to hang washing up and have a chat.

It had windows on two opposite sides. A lovely big high up dormer window on one side flooded it with light while a tiny old fashioned under the eaves window had less obvious delights. It was the little window that the clematis grew in through. It was the little window that allowed reflections of flowers and grass and people on the path below to appear blurrily on my sloping ceiling when there was bright sunshine.

The ceiling sloped on both sides and so did my floor more subtly. The old wooden skeleton of the house was exposed and black while the brick inbetween was white. Everything was uneven. I had a basin with a mirror with a horse silhouette sticker and a glass shelf above. In the winter my pipes would freeze. There was a black shelf in the other corner by the airing cupboard which was home to a china schoolroom which was a light as well as one of the speakers of my hi-fi.

Inbetween the airing cupboard and one of the other doors was my bed, an oversize single that had been my dad's as he had grown up. One wall had a fitted wardrobe with a window seat under the little window. I hated it, ugly varnished pine slats with big round door knobs.

I had three bookcases, a tall skinny by my bed, a lovely glass doored one that had been my Gran's until she moved and an old church one that sat on the big wooden desk. In order to make things tidy everything would get pushed under my bed. Sometimes things ended up there that I never remembered taking to my bedroom and had no interest in.

the house would creak and make a whole host of noises as it moved and each and evry noise was familiar and comforting. I never had nightmares as a child, although my older sister would sometimes drift through my room to my parent's like some pale ghost.

I had a painted paper fish mobile which sat in my dormer window and a small collection of beswick horses. The posters changed many times.....

When I go home I don't get to sleep in it very often now because F and I don't fit in a single bed. Sometimes if I go home alone I do and I love it. Being in that room.

I guess the thing I loved most was the airy spacy light feeling even thouh I had plenty of clutter. I loved the light so much, I always had plenty and a beautiful view of the sky. I miss that. I have big windows in my house but they face the wrong way mostly to get good light, I don't have views of the sky either...

TAW End of Week Two Review

I am not sure i liked week two much. It might have been this week itself rather than TAW that did it but I have really struggled....

The morning pages havn't been done most days. I started again yesterday and all that is coming out right now is self-indulgent, grasping, selfish stuff. It feels icky right now and I am not enjoying them. I am not sure they are useful. Maybe I just have to get through it. Maybe it was the eclipse.

I managed two pages.

They just smacked of unhappiness and discontent.

I consider last night's escapades to be this week's artist date. If last night wasn't time spent alone feeding my soul then nothing will ever be.... It felt deep and meaningful. Very spiritual. Very important (to me anyway!).

More Imaginary Lives

Scriptwriter

Dog walker

Clothes designer

Florist

Painter


I have no idea where scriptwriter came form. I am not sure I like writing dialogue....

I have a dog to walk and I do like walking her but it would be nice to get paid for doing it....

I guess I would love to have clothes that fit me properly. There could be nice things to make me look good but finding them can be tricky. I would love to be able to make my own clothes, for me, that fit perfectly...

I always enjoyed going into the garden and cutting flowers and arranging them. I must admit I prefer these garden blooms to the over perfect florist flowers. I wish my garden had more flowers in it. That I could wander around and pick...

I like paint. I like colour.....

20 Things I Enjoy

I enjoy...

1) spending time with F (1/8/09)

2) bathing (29/7/09) (normally with a book...)

3) having a massage (June I think)

4) horse riding (2006 I think)

5) walking somewhere beautiful (last weekend)

6) eating chocolate (1/8/09)

7) going out for a meal (1/8/09)

8) going to the cinema (a couple of weeks back)

9) going to the theatre (last summer)

10) creating things (yesterday)

11) learning how to do new things (using oracle deck)

12) making jewellery (two weeks ago)

13) playing badminton (last year)

14) swimming (no idea)

15) dancing (er...)

16) playing board games (no idea)

17) writing (last week)

18) reading (1/8/09)

19) cooking a nice meal (last week)

20) meeting the girls (July)

I found this really time consuming! Surprisingly hard to think of so many individual things!

My two goals for this week are....

1) to book a massage

2) make f play some board games with me....

TAW and Changes

I have noticed a change in myself this last couple of weeks...

I don't know what the cause is exactly...

It could be TAW and the morning pages (which I don't always manage to complete)

It could be my lovely charm bag and smokey quartz necklace

It could be the ginseng I have started taking each day

It could be the antibiotics I am taking to be rid of my lump that are also having the effect of clearing up my skin condition

It could be the lovely reiki energy a friend offered to send me

I don't know, it doesn't matter.

So what is this change?

I don't know if ever I have said before but sometimes I have the most amazing dreams. The sort where the most amazing and fantastic things happen. Where all is good and great and happy and life is just one fantastic adventure of joy. Except then I wake up and I can't remember the dream. Then I remember my life and the feeling dies, snuffed out and gone.

I am feeling an echo of that happiness inside myself.

My body is without a doubt happier and I know I have more energy. I know it successfully fought off a nasty cold without laying me low and making me take time off to fight it. I think that is a separate change....

Last night I wrote the two letters and I just wasn't happy with the second one. It was stale and dull. I posted them and I just knew I had to go back. And a story flowed out of my fingers. And when the story was done, I liked it. It said what I wanted it to say. I think more importantly it did what it said it did. Something has been unblocked somewhere along the line. Having stories back in my soul gives me back that feeling that life can be magical and beautiful. It doesn't matter if it is dull and mundane if you can feel the magic and it flows from your fingers.

I have no idea what I shall write next but I know that this writing malarky is good for me. I think back to where I was when I first started this blog. I like craft but there is something about a good story...

I know there is more to come in my artist pages. So far they are relatively dull but every so often there is a small gem of an idea as something steps in and carries me somewhere for a moment....

... mostly to fly with the seagulls who carry their souls between their wings...

... are seagulls the free souls of fishermen lost at sea?

I feel a story brewing, I just have to work out how to get it out and how to make it all fit... I hope I can...

Letters (reposted)

Some TAW things... They may not make great reading *laugh*

***

Dear Mr C

I wanted to thank you. I know I was probably just another kid that you taught but one day you took the time to lend me one of your own possessions. One you thought I might enjoy. It was just another book. Except it wasn't.

It was a fantastic book. An intelligent book, not one you perhaps think 'young teenage girl'. It was a book written by a woman who might be described by some as feminist and eco-warrior but really she is just a smart woman who believes in equality.

It wasn't a book my school would much have liked and they would never have had it in their library. But yet you leant it to me and trusted me not to spread it around, to take care of it and to respond to being introduced to something like this. You showed believe in me as a person, as an adult.

I may not have been enthusiastic about the book when I returned it, I can't remember. I went on to read many books by this author and she is still one of my favourites. She has helped shape my thinking.

Thank you for showing you believed in me, you didn't just lend me a book, you opened a door.

p.s. I loved the purple smoke

***

Despicable Miss W

You stole my stories. You took them from me. My ideas chained in grammar. Lost under the weight of spelling. Did you know you stole them? Did you mourn their loss? Did you see my writing lose it's flame? Did you see me lose my fire? Did you know that with my stories, the light in my eyes died in the wind?

My stories were the most huge adventures, the most awesome tales. Did you take the time to find out what they were? Did you listen with your soul? Had your sense of awe and wonder died to? Did someone take your ability to enjoy a good yarn? Did you kill mine through spite or lack of understanding or were you just doing your job?

Your judgement of me left me thinking I was thick for years. I wasn't. You didn't have all the facts. I was young. I was too young. I caught up but I never caught my confidence and self belief again. Not in school anyway.

You stole from me, but I take it back, it is mine and you can not keep it from me, it is who I am. I want my stories back....

***

That's not right.... *sigh*

***

Once upon a time there was a beautiful little girl who could tell stories. Her stories took her to beautiful lands where there were amazing adventures to be had. Dragons and unicorns lived alongside animals never seen before in any story before or since. Her stories flowed from the secret place of magic within her.

One day an evil old woman asked her to tell a story and so the little girl did. It was a story of amazing beauty and wonder and the old woman listened intently. Or at least she did for a while and then she said

'You need to pause and take a breath occasionally. Try breaking your words down into proper sentences and then you won't end up getting short of breath.'

The little girl thought about this and thought it sounded very proper. She went to start her story again but she couldn't remember where she was. The story was gone, but that didn't matter, there was another, waiting eagerly to be born.

And so she began another story, a tall story of moon and mist and all the things inbetween.

The evil old lady scowled and after a very short while she interupted again.

'Oh i don't think that sounded right at all, you need to remember never to begin a sentende with but or and.'

The little girl's lower lip began to tremble a little. The story was gone but another grew and there it was a fable of foxes and forests.

'oh don't say the fox and me, say the fox and I'

The fable died but another grew of waves and mermaids and songs of beauty from beneath the waves.

'That was the wrong form of the verb it is you are, not you is'

The mermaids wrung their hair in sorrow and a tale of bear and eagle on a mountain of ice began

'Which form of the word are you using? B-E-A-R or B-A-R-E?'

Moles in pink winged glasses burrowing for hidden treasures....

'Your story needs a beginning, a middle and the end. You can't start at the end.'

Blue haired...

'Blue hair isn't sensible!'

Pink

'no'

Princess

'NO'

Moon

'No. this just won't do! Capital letters and full stops. Sentences have to make sense all by themselves. Use the right form of the verb. Spell all the words right. Never, ever make up words, use the dictionary....'

On and on it went. Each comment from the evil old woman stole a story from the Little girl. Each spell made it harder for her to hear what the stories were trying to tell her from deep within. Until she couldn't hear any more. They were gone and she sat there numb and practiced the form of the verb to be with the evil old woman before learning how to correctly join the letters a and e neatly together.

The little girl was so grateful that she was learning how to make her stories better that she didn't notice. One day she tried to tell a story and all that came out were words that sounded like the evil old woman

'i before e, except after c. No! That isn't a story!'

She sobbed.

She wailed, but the stories had gone and she cried for their loss. She couldn't remember the story of how to get them back. She was lost and she couldn't hear and she was alone and lost without them.

She went to the house of the evil old woman and she took out her fountain pen and stabbed the evil old woman with it. Everytime her pen swopped down, a story was freed....

A bunny rabbit with a tail of silver...

And again her pen flew.

A walk across the surface of the sun...

And down into the evil old woman it fell.

The evil old woman lay at her feet, quite dead. Covered in blood and ink.

The little girl looked on in horror but then a story grew inside her head.

Once upon a time there was a beautiful queen who was put under a spell that could only be broken with blood and ink and the words of a storyteller true....

The Artist's Way: Review of Week One

So far there has been nine days since I started but I am very firmly still on week one. I don't feel ready to move on. I completed the morning pages 7 out of nine mornings, once I didn't because I had to take F to work and he hadn't warned me before and today I didn't because i was depserate to finish my book...

I have had two artist's dates, or at least what I am going to count as such.... I coated myself in mud and played with the mud and had a mud bath. I took some cheap hen party accessories and altered them up to make them fantastically pink and tacky.

Even so, I can barely remember what I read in the first chapter and need to re-read it before i move on to chapter two.

I struggled with the affirmations and blurts. I didn't do them the first day and then completely forgot them. Although I did do some of the exercises, there is more I want to do. What I did was limited. I have a bad memory, I can't remember individual words just the gist of things so I can't remember any compliments, except backhanded ones.

This doesn't entirely surprise me. I find it easily to deal with the negative and I am very comfortable living in a middle of the road sort of a place, but living fully in the positive? Hmmmm, I need to work on this more this week. I need to move into the positive and not onto week two, not yet...

Angels and Demons

This post is a bit of a work in progress but I figure if I start writing more will come out as well. It is for my The Artist's Way book (TAW) which I am doing with a group called On The Wing. The book asks you to think back to discover who some of your monsters and heroes were. Those who encouraged your artistic endeavours and those who didn't, who damaged instead.

***

Miss W was the first teacher I had when I changed school at seven. She was in charge of a tiny class which I was part of and the year above which was larger. We were all in the same room together and I spent two years there. When I joined the school, I was the youngest in the whole school. I loved to write. It was agreed I had a fantastic imagination but somehow that didn't feel like an entirely positive thing, or at least not positive enough to outweigh the problems with my writing.

***

When TAW talks about the censer I see an old woman with grey hair in a bun and glasses in a 70s styley with slight wings to the side and a glasses chain round her neck. She is looking over the top of them a little. She looks bored and boring, self righteous, fuddy duddy.... She is sat at a desk stacked high with papers and she has a pen, and old fashioned one and a jar of ink. She is scrutinising each and every paper and destroying it slowly under the weight of her own marks...

You see my brain had the story and my pen struggled to keep up. My handwriting was awful. There was no grammar or punctuation. My sentences went on and on and there was just no stopping them. And as for my spelling....

They looked at my work and tested me for dyslexia. I wasn't dyslexic. They put me in the 'special' classes at lunch times to make sure I caught up. Everything I did wasn't good enough because I was behind. At the school I had come from I had spent the year with a lovely teacher. It was all play based but I remember more lessons from that classroom than I do the ones before or immediately after. Somehow all that play and fun became bad because now I was behind and that just wouldn't do.

It took me years to figure out but I eventually did... In my old school which was state run, I had been one of the oldest children. My birthday fell very close to the cut off point for that year and I just missed out on being in the year above. My new school didn't worry about dates and cut off points for the year. I got put up a year by accident and no one realised. Maybe my spelling and grammar and punctuation and sentence structure were not as bad as all that.... Maybe they didn't have to destroy my stories to make my writing perfect, but they did....

***

After I spent my two years in that class, I moved to a new one with a new teacher Miss E. Miss E was a spinster nearing retirement but she had an energy to her. There was no lack of discipline in her class and sometimes she was hard and strict but she was always consistent and fair. Both my sister and I liked being in her class. I don't so much remember her lessons as things that happened and some of the rules. If you were stuck you couldn't queue at her desk if there were more than three there. If you were there you had to listen to what she was saying to others in case it helped you.

She was very Christian and one girl had a copy of the Demon Headmaster. It was taken away. One time I picked up an out of date factual book and she saw it and took it from me and ripped it up because it was out of date. I remember wanting to take it out of the bin and make it better...

I remember that she always said I would write a book one day. She said it more than once and she said it to my Mum as well, who repeated it to me. I remember that belief in me. I remember that rules and discipline are not counter to care and love. You can be strict and loving at the same time, if you do it right....

***

Later on when we had different teachers for different subjects there was Mrs D. She mis-prounounced my name for years but I never told her, it wasn't important. She was an English teacher and she taught us to dissect questions for reading comprehension. She had us take different parts in Shakespeare and read aloud, which helped us all understand it, Shakespeare has to be spoken....

She knew I had book club money even though it was mostly younger ones that used it lots. There was always something there choosen for me, something she thought I might like. She encouraged.

Mrs D is both a hero and a monster. She is a monster because she had to mark and to her red pen, my writing was never perfect, no matter how much soul I put in it. I don't think marking is always a good thing. If a clever and able child who can write well can't get full marks then who can? What good does that do anyone?

She is a hero because she gave us interesting things to write about and encouraged us to love books and writing. Because when I found myself writing a pagan creation myth that came from nowhere she didn't treat it as anything other than a good piece of writing. In such a Christian school she could very easily have made a lot of trouble with that piece of writing. Instead it was entered as a piece of coursework for my GCSE. This was however a mixed blessing as none of us ever got any of our coursework back....

***

And now for an art teacher or two... Both I think monsters.

We had a task to create a picture using white, black and newspaper. I created a fish jumping out of a river. It was a simple enough picture and din't take too long but the fish was exactly as I wanted it. The river was exactly as I wanted it. The clouds were exactly as I wanted them. I had managed to reproduce the picture in my head perfectly. I liked it. He didn't. It didn't tick some nice little box that he had I guess.

I remember one time we had to pick two letters and find a font and use those two letters to mask out areas across a page and colour the gaps inbetween. I liked what I produced. So did the art teacher. I remember him staring at it intently and then saying that he thought I would make a good little artist, probably even better than my sister.

Now I have issues with my sister, she has long time been built up and me knocked down in order to try and make us more equal. What started as a compliment turned into trouble as soon as he said I might be better than her. I wasn't allowed to be better than her. Not really....

In the art room there was a long row of cupboards down one side and on top was a huge number of fantastic items for people to draw. Things that had been collected over years and years from all over the world. They drew us like moths to a flame but we couldn't touch and God forbid we try and draw them. They were too hard and they were for the real artists who did A-level or maybe towards the end of GCSE. I never, ever got anywhere near them. I am sure I could have had a damn good go if someone had given me some nice pastels to play with....

***

My last hero is an unlikely one, a gay chemistry teacher. He had a class full of girls who were not necessarily overly interested in the finer intricacies of chemistry. He did all the fun stuff, maybe not teaching exactly what he should but making sure we had some fun in there too... He made purple smoke one day in the fume cupboard. He showed us interesting reactions and had us play with fun substances. He blew things up and burned them. We didn't like the proper chemistry and all those titrations but we liked the other bits.

He leant me a book one day. Out of the blue I think. The Enigma Score by Sheri S. Tepper. I havn't read it in years but Sheri S. Tepper is one of my favourite authors to this day and one day I shall re-read that old book just to see if it is in much the same style as her later books. You see her current stuff is high fantasy with a woman's rights and environmental twist. She doesn't preach but she makes you cry in sympathy at the injustice and that raises you up as she takes it all somewhere ehere beauty wins out... He did me a good favour that day. I often wonder why me and why that book. Did he see something in my soul that he was trying to help fly free? He planted a seed... One I chose to grow.