Brief History of a Marriage in Decline

In September 1996 I moved to Moffat against my will. I've probably already told you this so won't elaborate except to say I was hit with a false dichotomy: move or divorce. Because I couldn't see our son growing up without his father I moved.

In November 2006 I received an email from a woman who told me she and my husband had been together for three and a half years. Rather than being furious I was relieved that my suspicions were not of my own toxic making. Stevie and I went to counselling in an attempt to rescue our marriage. In April 2007 I discovered he was still in contact with her.

I've spent the last five years trying to work out what is wrong with me. Why do I drive my husband to deception? Is my notion of honesty impossible for anyone else to live with. Am I hideous, am I bad?

A few weeks ago in a last ditch attempt to work things out I made an appointment for us to see a psychotherapist who deals in relationship counselling because Stevie kept telling me he was very unhappy. He made it sound like it was my fault, but whereas in the past I would have taken on that responsibility, this time I felt unable to. Surely a person's happiness is their own responsibility. If he was so unhappy with me he was free to leave.

A few months ago I was introduced to a man who wanted help with a book he's writing, we connected immediately. He's an artist, a storyteller, a musician. A wonder. I began to spend more time with him than was probably decent.

The sessions with the therapist were fascinating, and after the third one I realised there was no hope for Stevie and me. I decided that at the fourth I'd bring this up.

I phoned my sister and told her about Dave. She was delighted and advised me not to have an affair but to be open and honest, and ask for a divorce first. I told her that's exactly what I planned to do.

I didn't stick to the plan.

Just over a week ago I left Stevie and moved into Dave's delightful little cottage. I didn't know it was possible to be this happy. And I hope with all my heart that Stevie finds someone to be this happy with too; he's not a bad man, we just seemed to bring out the worst in each other.

Now I need to find a job and make a plan or two: it's terrifying but breathtakingly exciting...

Word Verification

has become ghastly. How the hell do I turn it off?

And:

Eowyn Ivey (left) with Liz Roberts.

last night's book event was marvellous. Ivey, as you can see from the (terrible quality) photograph above, read a couple of passages from The Snow Child, answered questions (posed by Liz Roberts and the audience) with candour, and generally charmed. At one point she told us that every copy sold of her book brings her a little closer to getting a well (she currently has to haul water daily to fill a tank in the basement).

Circumstances conspired to stop me buying a copy of the book: the UK cover isn't nearly so appealing as the one in the post below, and the women from the bookshop that were selling it couldn't be bothered to get their debit/credit card machine from the car: "There's a cash point just outside." One of them said.
"Is there?" I asked Marilyn who was standing beside me.
"Yes, well, it's the one at the bank in the high street." She told me.
"Bugger that!" I said, "I'm not walking all the way over there."
I would have walked all that way to get my hands on that cover, but not this one:

So I'll get it for my Kindle.

Buzz

Moffat suddenly seems to have become the place to be. Thursdays at the Black Bull are a must for music lovers. A recent concert sold out in hours. Brodies, the restaurant/cafe/bistro whose cakes and dishes I've been posting shots of for a while now, is constantly packed with friendly munchers and sippers (they already have only two tables left for Hogmanay!). And now a major new Alaskan author is coming here as part of her five day UK book launch tour.

Eowyn Ivey's book has been selected by Oprah Magazine as among 10 titles to "Pick Up Now" in the February issue; by Waterstones as a UK Waterstones prestigious "11" award; as a book to watch by all number of newspapers including The Independent and The Times; will be Radio 4's Book at Bedtime in April, and is already a bestseller in Norway.

This is what her website says about the book:


In The Snow Child, a couple creates a child out of snow. When she appears on their doorstep as a little girl, wild and secretive, their lives are changed forever.


Alaska, 1920: a brutal place to homestead, and especially tough for a couple who have never been able to conceive. Jack and Mabel are drifting apart—he breaking under the weight of the work of the farm; she crumbling from loneliness and despair. In a moment of levity during the season's first snowfall, they build a child out of snow. The next morning the snow child is gone, but they catch sight of an elusive, blonde-haired girl running through the trees.


This little girl, who calls herself Faina, seems to be a child of the woods. She hunts with a red fox at her side, skims lightly across the snow, and leaves blizzards in her wake. As Jack and Mabel struggle to understand this child who seems to have stepped from the pages of a fairy tale, they come to love her as their own daughter. But in the Alaska wilderness, life and death are inextricable, and what they eventually learn about Faina changes their lives forever.


Eowyn was inspired to write the novel after she discovered the classic Russian fairy tale of the snow maiden. She was shelving books in the children's section of Fireside Books when she happened across a copy of Freya Littledale's retelling of the fairy tale with illustrations by Alaskan artist Barbara Lavallee. The story haunted Eowyn with its loneliness and magic in a landscape so similar to the one she grew up in. She spent the next few months researching the original tale, and depictions of it in Russian art work, before she began writing.


The Snow Child has been described as a "remarkable achievement", "stunningly conceived" and "enchanting from beginning to end."

How fab does that sound?

The event takes place at Moffat House Hotel on Saturday 18th February, from 6pm. Tickets are a mere seven quid. I'll be there with fellow members of the new Moffat Writing Group (name yet to be decided) whose inaugural meeting is this Thursday, 7pm at the school.*

So, musician or music lover, writer or book lover: rather wonderfully I seem to find myself living in a town full of fellow tribesmen.

*This group follows on from the classes I've been teaching.

Ten Minute Post

Here's the deal: I keep not blogging because I keep thinking I don't have time. I have a billion-squillion things to blog about but... So, I've put the timer on and will allow myself no longer than ten minutes to say something.

What? Lord knows. But I have only 8 minutes 39, no 34, 32 seconds left.

Jolly marvellous week last week, I did none of the things I mentioned in my last post. Well, I read a bit. Was that one of the things though, can't remember and don't have time to check: 6 minutes 38 seconds left.

Hebden Bridge, bloody marvellous place. We landed there quite spontaneously last Wednesday evening. Husband had to go to the Lakes then on to Bolton on business and would spend the night in some roadside hotel. Again! I said. This seems to be becoming a thing. Come with me, he said. So I did.

My breakfast in what must be the world's friendliest hotel. We will go back

Obviously I didn't want to stay in some corporate sleep-hole, so he unbooked the hotel and looked for another. Where do you want to stay? He asked. Hebden Bridge, I said. Where's that
I told him, and we went. We ate the best Thai food ever that evening, and the next day (after his Bolton meeting, and my breakfast) explored the town. I want to move there. Before I run out of time (just over a minute to go) I'll find a photo.

Shit, time's up and I seem to have turned some of the text into a link, but to where? Excuse the typos...

Restless

Not my garden, sadly.

Like a wasp at the bins of an amusement park cafe who can see a can of Raid on the windowsill, I buzz but don't dive in.

The research assistant position is mine. It involves interviewing eleven students for an hour apiece and then transcribing those interviews. Having worked in recruitment for a number of years the first part shouldn't be too difficult once I've dealt with the rust. The second part, one of my bosses was at pains to point out, will be arduous. Hours of listening, rewinding, straining, and typing. But he gave me some tips and I expect it will be fine once I get used to it. Time consuming but rather interesting. Next week I'll do a practice interview on a willing student, and then begin in earnest. So I have a week of utter freedom.

From my list of 'really want to dos' I'm at liberty to choose. But which one?

I would like to tackle my manuscript and begin the rewrite. I've been itching to do this for a while, but I know I'll need absolute isolation. If I do this I will do nothing else. I'll have to be able to utterly immerse myself in the task, and I fear a week won't be long enough. Time enough to read the thing and make a few notes, though. Should I do that, make a start?

I'd also like to get on with my Burma Book. Dig out the notes I made when visiting my aunt last summer, make the dishes she taught me, take photos, write more notes, before it all becomes a haze. Also, I'd like to have a mini version done by the end of May for a particular purpose I can't tell about just incase a particular person reads this.

And I'd like to work on my photographic post-processing skills – or lack thereof – in Lightroom. I'd also like to read the dozen or so books that have piled up on my kindle. And bake a coffee cake. And finish the few small jobs left in the bathroom (I still haven't chosen flooring, and there's a bit of grouting that needs to be seen to).

The garden needs some attention. The kitchen floor is crying out for a fresh coat of paint. This room is beginning to resemble a junk-shop again.

Ice-cream, cheeseburger, ketchup coated chips, jelly tots, iced bun, chocolate coated melting moment...

The Shrinking of the List

Today I completed the last of my 'for other people' tasks. Teaching over, I provided feedback on the last student story, and emailed it to her immediately, before I felt compelled to read it again and add to my comments. Jobs like this could go on indefinitely if I allowed them to.

And I, finally, finished editing the images from an overlarge, overindulgent, photo shoot.

Our local blacksmith plans to clean up the front portion of his workshop and turn it into a showroom for the stoves he sells. So he asked me, through Stevie, if I'd take some photos before he does so. Yes, I said, I'd love to. The place is astonishing, filled with all sorts of tools and boxes, old signs and crates. Buried amongst the drill bits I was sure I'd find the very story of blacksmithing. How could I say no?

But I'm no professional photographer, I'm just a woman with a camera who likes stories, so off I went with my non-professional camera, a tripod, and one light, and snapped away for about three or four hours. It wasn't until I uploaded the shots to my computer and looked at them that I thought, 'shit!'

It's taken me over a month to go through them all and decide on which ones to give him and which to discard. I'm crap at post production, photoshop fills me with dread, so apart from a little cropping and lightening/darkening if a photo isn't any good when it comes off the camera there's nothing I can do to save it. The other problem is I worry that the story in my head, and that comes out in my shots, isn't the same as the story in anyone else's. I worry that the photos I take will be boring for everyone else. So one of the reasons it took me so long to edit this batch was that I spent hours staring at each one wondering if this is what he, the customer wants. That I haven't asked for anything in return, let alone money, doesn't render an affirmative answer to that question any less important. I really don't want to give him a pile of disappointing images. But what can I do, the photos I took are the photos I took?

Now my 'other people' tasks are done I am free to do my 'me' tasks. Though tomorrow (actually today now I see the time) I have a meeting at the university about a research assistant position that has come up. If they feel I can do it, and I feel I can do it this free time will be short. While it lasts I'll come and read as many of your blogs as I possibly can, and finish my book (that's the one I'm reading, not the one I'm writing which will have to wait a little longer).

P.S. Did you hear that Pure by Andrew Miller, which I read during my book a day challenge (see last post) and loved, has just won the Costa?

Wordly Wallow

Early last week I stumbled upon Goodreads, a website dedicated to reading. I suppose it's a bit like Facebook in that it's a bit social, a bit networky, only its purpose is more particular. I haven't fully explored it yet, and I probably never will, but I've joined and begun the ride. It appealed to me because I can never remember what I've read and, thus, have a tendency to buy the same books twice, or even three times. I'll start reading and think: "this seems familiar." And Goodreads allows you to see, once you've input them, all the books you have read, and all the ones you want to read. I could, in theory, do that anyway by a) looking at my shelves or kindle, and b) writing out a list, but lists get misplaced and, well, it takes more than a glance at my shelves to show me what I've read. So I joined Goodreads for no other reason than to keep track of my reading.

Then I discovered that it has the facility to allow you to set yourself a challenge to read a certain number of books a year. I've never, ever, considered how many books I read in a year. I know only that some years I read a lot, and other years I read bugger all. But I'm trying to take myself in hand and live with a bit more purpose. It's all very well being spontaneous. Lovely, in fact, when one is young and has all the time in the world. However it gets less lovely when one reaches my age and finds the most spontaneous thing one manages, on a regular basis, is to have an extra biscuit with a cup of tea. So I set my challenge to read a hundred books this year. If I – spontaneously – read more, all well and good.

Last Wednesday I, rather spontaneously, decided to try and read a book a day for a week. I'd read of the death of George Whitman, owner of  the luscious Shakespeare and Company in Paris, and remembered the story about how he takes in aspiring writers who need a place to stay. They can live in the shop, sleeping on makeshift beds amongst the books, as long as they read a book a day. When I first read about that I thought it impossible. I couldn't imagine being able to do anything else if I was to try and read a whole book every single day. But on Wednesday I wondered if it was more a skill that with practise one could hone. Why not give it a go? I thought. So I did. I only sort of managed it.

On Wednesday I read

without too much trouble, though having not begun until 10 o'clock I didn't finish it till about 4 o'clock on Thursday morning. 

On Thursday I intended to read

but

arrived in the post. I didn't actually order if for myself, it's a gift, but I read it anyway. In about ten minutes. I began Pure at my usual time of much too bloody late, and when at about half past four on Friday morning I was still only half way through I convinced myself that having read the Michael Rosen I had done my reading duty for that day and went to bed.

On Friday we went to a concert, and I did mean to come home early and finish the Miller. But that didn't happen. I got back at about 2am and, although I did pick up my Kindle, switch it on, and stare at the words, I couldn't focus. So I went to bed. This meant on Saturday I was under a bit of pressure, not to mention tired and faintly hungover (the concert had ended in the pub). But by dedicating the entire day to reading (I didn't even get dressed) I did finish Pure and immediately begin

which I didn't finish that night. 

On Sunday I had to rethink: I hadn't read a book a day but could I save myself from utter failure? I finished the Joan and picked up 

which I did finish before going to bed. Hurrah! On Monday I read

Couldn't find a good sized picture of this one.

which was lovely. And, finally, on Tuesday I read

which was quite a lesson. 

So I didn't manage to read a book a day – so much for spontaneity! – but did read seven books in a week. Whether that means I failed is, I suppose, a matter of perspective. 

Did I enjoy this week of wallowing in literature? Yes, but I don't think I'll do it again. When I read I often stop and stare into space for a while, and it's not for some time after reading a book that I begin to know what it was all about. Reading one book after another robbed me of the space to process those books. The time to stop and let the images come alive. I could tell you, sketchily, what they were about but not much more. It was more like racing than reading, more about the challenge than the books, and I'll probably have to read them all again if I want to really know them. From now on I'll try for two books a week.

Because I'd already read three books this year I'm now ahead of schedule with regard my target, which is slightly worrying. There is nothing more likely to scupper target reaching than complacency, and nothing more likely to instill complacency than being ahead. Whenever I feel I can do something I relax, often to such a degree that I fail to accomplish it. So we'll see. I have a book a friend lent me that I haven't got round to reading yet, the pressure to return it to her is building up, so I'll start that tonight.

Goodreads, then, I like it so far and recommend it to those of you who, like me, could do with a bit of bookish organization.

Mandolin and Guitar, Picasso

Music, argued Nietzsche, is the purest form of art. I think I've read something similar from Picasso and a number of other artists: they would make music, they say, if they could. But they don't have the talent so they paint, write, sculpt. Why "purest"?

No doubt theorists have discussed this to death. I don't want to join them here: research definitions of art and postulate dryly. I just want to feel it. I have seen paintings that stir something physical and make me feel more alive, but music is the only art form that makes me want to dance. I love it, yet I rarely listen to it because when I do I can't concentrate on anything else.

I can't hold a conversation when there's music playing; I can't cook, or read, or write. I can clean the house, so when I remember I put my iPod in a pocket and attach headphones. I can run to music so I do get to listen, and move, to it for an hour most days. On the whole, though, I live a fairly musicless existence. Or did.


There was a time when I was a regular clubber. We lived in Glasgow for a while and there were lots of places a person who likes to dance could go. So I did. I went with a friend, she had different reasons for going to clubs, but that was fine. She would get on with her thing and I would make my way to the dance floor and stay there till the lights came on. Then I'd go home, my friend having long since found what she thought she was looking for and left. For the next few days my life as a young housewife and mother would seem less mundane. My head would be clearer. I'd feel brighter. That was twenty years ago, and it's been a long time now since I've danced regulalry. I'm not sure if that's to do with age or living in the country, there are no clubs here, no dancing opportunities. But if I lived in a city would I still go?

Three Dancers, Picasso

Probably not. In a place full of twenty-somethings I'd feel inappropriate, and as for those over forty nights my experience has been that they're full of desperate men:

"Can I buy you a drink?"
"No thank you."
"Oh go on, it's just a drink."
"It is, but I don't want one."
"You've been dancing for ages, you must be thirsty."
"It's very kind of you, but, no, I'm not."
"Are you a lesbian or something?"
"I don't think so. Do lesbians not get thirsty?"
"Don't get smart with me!"
"Do apologise."
"Come on, let me buy you a drink. Where are you going?"
"To dance."
"One drink?"
"Look," I say, waving my left hand.
"Well, what the fuck are you doing in here?"
"Dancing."
"You're leading people on."
"How?"
"A woman on her own. Where's you're husband?"
"He's at home."
"Does he know where you are?"
"Of course."
"Is he an idiot?"
"Oh, for god's sake! I came here to dance, because I like it. Dance, not drink, not chat. Now, go away."
"Fucking lesbian."
Why does a certain type of man think that's an insult? They seem to be saying: "you want to have sex with the same type of people I do, you freak!"

I do feel I'm being unfair because, in truth, those places aren't about music but about coupling, and being already coupled I don't belong. My clubbing, and thus dancing, days are over. My days of rising with music, though, aren't over at all.

I have found that being in the presence of live music, played by talented musicians who love it, utterly vivifying. I can sit still, listen, watch, and become myself. I've known this for a while but haven't had access.

A few years ago a couple of local musicians started practising on a Thursday night in one of the town's pubs. Word got round and others joined them. They gained an audience. Now on any given Thursday evening the Black Bull jumps. Musicians from far and wide come to join in, sometimes you can't get in to the room because there are so many people with instruments. Guitars, fiddles, accordions, pipes and whistles, last Thursday there was a chap with a double bass. It was fab.

I popped in after our writing class with a couple of my students, we sat in the back-room because there were no seats in the main one and one of us (let's call her Ingrid) can't stand for long. As we chatted I tried to zone out the music so it wouldn't distract me for fear of seeming rude. But once or twice I was grabbed by the sound and had to jump up and go to watch. And when I went to get more drinks I hung about listening for a little longer than was probably polite. When I went out for a fag, ditto. Then Ingrid left so Rosie and I, happy to stand, went into the main room to enjoy the full experience. She knows everyone so we chatted to a few people, but mostly we just listened, and watched. And I wondered if watching a painter paint would be just as enlivening. I'm pretty sure watching a writer write wouldn't.

At one point one of the guitar players walked past with a couple of CDs, and as I'd heard he and his musical partner had just released one, I quizzed him. And then, panning for pounds in the coppery soil of my purse, managed to scrape up the eight quid to pay for the joy of bringing their sound back to my house.

Later, when everyone had left, and I was getting my coat on, the last in the bar, Dave, who I'd bought the disc from came in and said: "Eryl, are you coming?" I thought he meant they wanted to lock up, so I wrapped my scarf around me and followed.

There was a whole crowd outside, and as I emerged they started to move off. I could see Rosie up ahead. I must have looked puzzled because a nice chap came and walked beside me and talked about the evening. On we went up one road and then another before turning into my own.
"Here it is." Said the friendly man.
There was Rosie: "I'm just going to get a CD, he didn't have any more on him."

That made sense. Dave, whose house it was came to the door: "Ah, come in!"
I hesitated, as I had no instrument, like the man who walked beside me, and I already had my CD.
"Eryl, come in."
So  I went in, and there was the double bass in the hall, and there was the double bass player making a mug of tea. And there was someone else rummaging in the freezer for vodka. And there was a glass of red wine pressed into my hand. And there was a chair by a bookcase, and a gesture made to sit.

So I sat, and for the next few hours listened to them play, and discovered what Nietzsche meant.  

For Weaver

I've lived in rural Scotland for fifteen years, though I hail from grimy semi-urban south-east England. When I first arrived here I thought: "Oh, how lovely, how beautiful, how fresh and green and natural!" And then didn't know what to do. It was a bit like looking at a Constable painting through a steamed-up lens, it didn't do anything, it just sat there looking green and pleasant. So for years I would drive up to Glasgow or Edinburgh on an almost daily basis for all sorts of odd, manufactured reasons. The real reason, that I just needed to stew in some dereliction, felt ungrateful.

Reverse parking into a space two fingers bigger than my car while other drivers sounded their horns impatiently made me feel at home. The acrid smell of the previous night's drinkers' bladder contents drying under a graffitied bridge, ditto. Truth is, beyond admiring its general prettiness, and air untainted by fuming taxis, I couldn't see the point of the countryside. And, anyway, I love the smell of diesel. But then I was paid a visit here in my virtual kitchen by the Weaver of Grass. And, as I was politely brought up, I paid her a visit back, and found myself in deepest Yorkshire.

Weaver is a woman who knows the country intimately, and understands all its layers. She loves it for what it is, and she has shown me, if not quite how to love it, how to appreciate it. How to look at it, listen to it, smell it: see it and feel it in other words. If you haven't done so read this post, in a few short paragraphs it evokes the drama of rural life. Wild, vivid, visceral, it's every bit as grimy and harsh as my beloved run-down city peripheries.

So, anyway, the point of all this is to explain why I'm posting the two following shots. Weaver asked to see more of the paintings (comments, 2 posts back) and this is my way of saying thank you to her.

This first is a painting by my sister-in-law, Sue Shields. It's of Goat Fell on the Isle of Arran (about 25 miles off the Ayrshire coast), and I inherited it.

When my mother-in-law died I was asked to choose anything I'd like from her house, and one of the things I chose was this painting. It had been at the top of the stairs in that house for years and it was always the first thing I noticed when the front door was opened on visits. So I began to associate it with my in-laws' cheery welcomes: the end of long, droning car trips and the start of idle summer breaks. Stuck in traffic on the M6, sweating in my un-airconditioned banger, or inching along the M1 it would seep into my mind like sea air. In fact, we only had to arrange a visit and I would see the painting grinning down at me from its spot on the landing wall. So when it had to vacate that spot I knew I had to take it in. Now it's in my work-room and whenever I glance up at it I am reminded of rolling up tired and hungry, knocking on a glossy green door, and seeing my in-laws beaming with joy at the sight of their grandson (and his parents!) on their doorstep.

This painting is by Bea Last (I think that's her name). I bought it at an open studio event and I think it's called Fire Walk II – though it may be III, and it may be bath. I don't really care what it's called, its title is not what I bought. What I bought is a bit of Bea Last and her dynamic studio. I may not remember her name correctly but I do remember her. Or, at least, her energy and vitality. There was something about her and her workspace that made me feel extra alive. And there was something about the story of the series of paintings this one comes from that made me have to bring one home. Don't ask me what that story is, I can't remember. But whenever I look at the painting I see her with her amazing mane of dark gypsy hair and strong hands walking through fire as if it is no more than a stiff breeze, and I feel a little stronger myself, and able to get on with the damn task. Which is what I have to do now.

I have a pile of exam papers to mark, so I'll be on the quiet side for a few days, but I will be back. This isn't going to be one of those extended breaks I'm prone to.

PS please excuse the fuzziness of both these photographs, it's been so dark today that I just couldn't fully focus.

Update: it's brighter today, so I retook the shots and have had slightly better results, the colours are truer, so I've now replaced the fuzzy ones with brighter ones.

My friend Katy, a brilliant young writer and philosopher, posted a quote on Facebook this morning and I like it so much I thought I'd share it with you.


Neil Gaiman's New Year Wish:


"I hope that in this year to come, you make mistakes.


Because if you are making mistakes, then you are making new things, trying new things, learning, living, pushing yourself, changing yourself, changing your world. You're doing things you've never done before, and more importantly, you're Doing Something.


So that's my wish for you, and all of us, and my wish for myself. Make New Mistakes. Make glorious, amazing mistakes. Make mistakes nobody's ever made before. Don't freeze, don't stop, don't worry that it isn't good enough, or it isn't perfect, whatever it is: art, or love, or work or family or life.


Whatever it is you're scared of doing, Do it.


Make your mistakes, next year and forever."

It says what I tried to say in my post yesterday, and so much better.

Christmas kindling

A couple of days ago I looked at the pile of paper sticks I'd made for kindling and thought it looked a bit Christmas treeish, so I placed some pine cones on it (thanks for those, Mary) and plonked a star on top. And it collapsed into a non treeish heap. Not a glorious mistake but, for me, a new one.

Happy, Jolly, Splendid

Just to say I hope the coming year brings you many little joys, and at least one strength increasing challenge, so that at the end of it you can look back and think "I did good!"  XXXXXXXXX

Resolve

I came across this quotation from Morton Feldman (who I meant to google, knowing nothing of him, but forgot) somewhere on the internet.

So I stamped it in my journal (with Christmas gift stamping kit!) and pondered.

I don't need to pursue anxiety, it follows me around like a starving dog. So, I'm lucky, I have plenty of material for my art. I just need to stroke it, and maybe give it a sausage, and then get to work.

I'm thinking of advertising my services as a cleaning lady as I need to earn money but want to keep my mind free to work on the second draft of my novel. New Year's Resolution #1: get the bloody book back on track.

I need to get my second book properly underway, too, so that's NYR #2, and learn Latin. I have a teach yourself book somewhere, NYR #3: locate it and spend half an hour a day on it. I wonder if half an hour's enough?

Stevie doesn't think I'll make it as a cleaner because my marketing skills are impossibly bad. But I'm not sure much more than a card in the newsagent's window is required. Of course, that might be because my marketing skills are impossibly bad.

Fairy Lights

Today in this the northern hemisphere is the shortest day, in terms of light. The darkest day of the year. Tomorrow will be lighter, and it will, daily, continue to get lighter and lighter, warmer and warmer, for six whole months. At first it won't feel any ligher, and it may be even colder tomorrow, but we will have the sun for a little longer. And so it will go. By February it will be noticeable, and I'll start saying things like: "blimey, it's still light and it's six o'clock!" I love February for that.

One of the benefits of being this age is experience: I know the light will return because it has done so for all of my (fifty) years. Dark may insinuate it's way into my life until it becomes a wall I can't get through or over, but all I need do is look back at all the other walls I have made it past, and not lose hope. It's not always easy to hang on to hope – I often need to manufacture it, and I guess that's one of the reasons we have Christmas: it gives us something to look forward to in the gloom – but it is possible, with a little help. I've just read The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society, and it was exactly the illumination I needed.

I have never experienced anything as cold and dark as the inhabitants of Guernsey did during WW2. I've never suffered long term starvation, or feared for my life, once, let alone daily for five years. And I never had to make a decision about whether to send my child away for his own safety, and then having decided to do so (wisely in hindsight) lost contact with him (and the whole of the outside world) for five years. How must it have felt to not know how one's child is faring, if s/he is alive or dead, healthy or sick? Every day must have felt interminable and barely tenable. My reading was halted at that part by, not just tears, convulsions. I had to take several deep breaths before I could continue. Yet those people, mothers, fathers, grandparents, kept going and, mostly, survived; their children came home, and light returned. I felt much better after reading The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society.

      

We have reached the bottom of the wintry abyss and all we have to do is hang on to hope in order to rise back up to the top. For this I think I'm going to need a lot of books, so if anyone has any light infusing recommendations I'd be very grateful.

Something for the Armoire

As I said two posts ago, the room in my head so recently vacated by two of my teaching jobs is large and echoey, and not unlike this:

Source: http://fibreciment.deviantart.com/art/LALM-09-124470018?q=gallery%3Afibreciment&qo=161

As you can see, other members of the dispossessed have been in and sprayed the walls with their secret messages. A stray dog wanders in from time to time, but never stays. A tramp poked his head in the door the other day and asked me if I needed anything. He could spare some change, he said, for a cup of tea. I said, thank you, but once I get the stove

Source: http://thecroft.wordpress.com/2007/01/

lit I'd make some. He was welcome to stay and have a cup, I told him, but he snorted and left. Maybe he was a Twinings man.

Anyway, I'm beginning to feel more at home here, I dragged an armoire off a skip, gave it a lick of paint, and already the echoes have quietened.

Last night, whilst dozily blog browsing I popped into Monica's , briefly joined in the chat about what to do with ideas, and happily left with something (to flog the metaphor to death) to place on a shelf in the armoire. I think it might be fine French linen.

Regular readers of this blog will know I  keep a journal, I've banged on about it on several occasions, it's mostly filled with whinings of the "I'm not writing..." sort. Monica doesn't keep a journal, but she does keep a notebook specially for ideas. This keeps them safe for possible future realization. Mmm...

I tend to scribble ideas on my wall, along with lesson plans, to-dos, and all number of other things. But they get wiped off before I ever get a chance to realise them, to make room, often enough, for new ideas. I could single out one of the huge number of note books that lurk, dustily, around this room and use it for the job, but I know myself well enough to know I won't use it regularly. My ideas usually resemble fleshless pinkie bones when they first appear, not really worth writing down on paper.

As I was leaving a comment on Monica's post it suddenly struck me: all I need do to safeguard ideas that may in the future be useful (fleshable), not to mention to-dos that have yet to be done, is take a snap of the wall before each wiping. Or, better still, every morning. This means when I get a new idea and need to jot it down before it evaporates I'll be able to clear a space for it without having to stop and find my camera. Which, lets face it, I'm unlikely to be bothered to do. So that's that then: every morning when I sit down with a cup of tea at my desk I will pick up my camera and take a shot of my wall. Here's the first one (be prepared to get very tired of this):

As you can see there's bugger all on it. And some of it's been there a while. I hope this will change as I retake possession of my head-space. 

I wonder if I'll be able to bring myself to wipe these names off now I know they'll be safely stored in a snap-shot? They were the first things I scrawled all those years ago because I was writing a lot of short stories (for my degree), and I kept calling all my characters Lucy. 

I don't write short stories any more, so I don't really need them, but, I don't know, there's something of the cenotaph about them which attracts me. 

So, recap, a little corner of my head-space is now cosy with the idea to take a photo of my wall every morning, and then wipe it clean. Or, should I wipe it? That could make me anxious to fill it just for the next shot, which isn't really the point.  

  

Hugo

I hadn't been to the cinema for ages, and I love films. But not having a tv or radio I rather relied on Bob (womb fruit) to keep me informed of what was on. Now he's gone off to become himself without parental interference I have no clue. However, when I logged on to Twitter for the Foyles Friday book game my eyes fell on a tweet from TED about Hugo. I can't remember what it said but whatever it was diverted my attention from the game and sent me off to find out more. And yesterday we went to see it.

God it was good. It's about secrets, and purpose; losing, finding, hiding, revealing. It's beautifully realised: the colours, the sounds, even the way the characters move contribute to the story.  As I sat and watched I was a child again, transported to a more colourful world for a couple of hours. I cried, I laughed, I gasped.

Set in 1930s Paris it's about an orphaned boy (Hugo) whose guardian – uncle Claude (Ray Winstone) – a station clock setter has disappeared. Hugo lives in the station and tends to the clocks while he waits for his uncle to return. While he waits he attempts to continue a task his father had begun before his death: fix an old, rusted automaton and find the key to make it work once more. He feeds himself by snaffling croissants, and does his best to avoid the station inspector (played brilliantly by Sasha Baron Cohen) who has a passion for sending stray children to the orphanage. Then one day he is caught trying to steal a clockwork mouse by the toy booth owner, Papa Georges... Hugo, I'd say, is about as perfect a Christmas film as I've seen in years, and it has set a seasonal tone to the weekend which I hope to eek out a little longer.

As luck would have it today is the last farmers' market before Christmas, thankfully it's neither raining, snowing, or blowing. So I'm off to see if Alison has any chutneys that might spruce up cold goose; what chocolate confections Dennis has to give as gifts, and if that nice smoked trout man has anything left (he tends to sell out early) to brighten the between Christmas and New Year table. I'm hoping the cheese lady is there too, and the man who makes delicious coconut fudge, not his only flavour but my current favourite. While I'm there I'll see if I can uncover a story or two.  

Industrial space

A friend told me recently that she had started her bucket list, I had to ask what that was. I think I will start one too, there are so many things about which I used to say "one day...", but I am beginning to feel that I have been flung past that day. If I don't make some plans, and implementation intentions, I'll find myself on my deathbed thinking "bugger!"

How cheery of me, first post in a month and I'm writing about death. Do apologise.

I seem to have been caught up in a whorl of work: teaching two community writing classes, and a textual analysis class to first year undergraduates at the local university campus. I love teaching but it takes up all the space in my head, so I get on with the rest of life rather like an ant. Now, though, two of the classes have finished and I should be back to normal, but that space, vacated, resembles a derelict warehouse. There's mould on the walls, a few broken panes, and a twisted tree growing in a corner. It needs a lick of paint, a few pictures on the wall, some heating. It's terribly echoey, and I've been wandering around it for the last week afraid to speak because my voice bounces back to me at an unholy volume. It needs furniture and rugs for absorption. I need to write again.

So, back to blogging: the cognitive equivalent of a huge armoire.

That's all I can think of to say for now, so here's a photo taken this morning from my bedroom window.

Tomorrow I'll see if I can find a little something to put in the armoire, even if it's only a stained tea towel.

First light

I have essays to mark. So, naturally, this seems like the perfect time to show you the newest addition to our family: a stove for burning wood (and coal). Installed in my work-room due to the prohibitive cost of mainstream fuel (gas, electricity) and my tendency to shut down when the temperature drops below 30º. Not only does it keep me more than warm enough (woollens have had to be removed!), its surface is hot enough to activate an espresso pot and heat milk to frothing temperature. No more electric kettle for me, not more gas ring, no more microwave: my staple latte can now be made without using any extra energy. I feel so green. Later in the week I hope to make a casserole on it.

Some photos (in the wrong order, really):

First cup of stove coffee.

This morning's coffee brewing (Stevie bought me the pot yesterday).

First fire, made by Derek (who installed it) to show me how to light and 'cure' it. 

As Promised

Today I made our Christmas cake, and as I was doing so remembered I'd promised to post the recipe for the chocolate yogurt cake of a couple of posts ago. So here it is now.

This recipe stands on the shoulders of Nigella Lawson's 'Buttermilk Birthday Cake' though it can't be said to be it. 

250g plain flour

1½ teaspoons baking powder

½ teaspoon bicarb

¼ teaspoon salt

50g cocoa powder (dark, unsweetened, the real deal)

100g dark chocolate (70%, or near as damn it, cocoa solids) melted

200g Greek yogurt (this needs to be the authentic, thick strained stuff)

1½ teaspoons vanilla extract

125g unsalted butter (very soft)

200g caster sugar

3 large eggs.

2 x sandwich tins, lined and buttered

Icing and filling.

300g dark chocolate (70% see above) broken into pieces 

250ml double cream

5 tablespoons greek yogurt

Preheat oven to gas 4 (180ºC).

Mix together, in a bowl, the flour, cocoa powder bicarb, baking powder and salt. Stir the vanilla extract into the yogurt.

Cream the butter and sugar together until light and fluffy. Add the eggs, one at a time, beating thoroughly after each (the last one may make the mixture curdle, but don't worry too much about that, it happens, the cake still rises). Stir in the melted chocolate until the whole is a dark chocolatey brown. Add about a third of the flour mix, stir in vigourously. Add about a third of the yogurt, combine. Continue in this way: flour, beat; yogurt, beat, until everything’s in. If it seems a bit solid add a little milk to loosen it. Pour into the prepared tins and bake for about 35 minutes. It’s done when it’s begun to shrink away from the sides of the tins, and/or a cake tester comes out clean.

Put the tins on a cooling rack until they are cool enough to handle without oven gloves, then turn the cakes out of the tins and onto the rack.

Once good and cold you can ice them. To make the icing, put the chocolate and cream in a saucepan, place on medium heat, and whisk – at times idly at others vigorously – with a hand-whisk until the chocolate has melted and combined with the cream. Leave it to cool a little (if you can stick your finger in and leave it there comfortably it’s cool enough). Take about a quarter of the icing from the pan and put it in a bowl. To this add the yogurt, this is your filling. 

Put one of the cakes on the plate or stand you plan to serve the it on. Spread with filling. Place the other on top, and cover with the icing. 

This is one of those cakes you can't really go wrong with. I've baked it in a saucepan before and it's still come out perfectly, and I have messed about with the yogurt quantities too, depending on how much I had. As with all recipes read it over a few times so you can get the shape of it in your head. Then get everything ready before you begin. This will allow you to go about calmly and make the whole thing fun rather than frustrating. 

Note on sweetness: I love cake but am not a huge fan of sugar, if you prefer a sweeter filling and/or icing just add some powdered sugar to taste.

Let me know if you make it and how you get on.

The bathroom is nearly finished. It's taking so long because we have more time than money, and we have very little time. We also lack skill.

There was a problem with the ceiling: old paper and gloss paint patches we couldn't shift. So we bought some lining paper and attempted to apply it. Stevie on a step ladder at one end, me on a cupboard at the other, long stick in hand, as you can imagine it didn't work. I had to rethink. I didn't want to emulsion over the glossy patches because I worried it wouldn't take, and I didn't want to faff about with oil based paint: too stinky. So we just left it the way it was thinking, all the while, that we would have to employ someone to do it for us when we could afford it. Then I saw a picture of an artist's house on Pinterest: she had wallpapered a room in scraps. I didn't like her choice of paper but I liked the idea, thus Stevie went hunting for odd roll ends. He came back with a huge bag load, but they were all a bit shiny and I'm not a huge fan of shine. Silverware, yes, eyes, absolutely, but not wallpaper. I was after more of an old quilt aesthetic.

I mentioned this to my WOW* ladies one Wednesday as we were chatting after a lesson (they are really coming on, by the way, some of their stories are wonderful) and one of them said she had had some old wallpaper sample books for a project, but they'd disappeared: "Go and ask round the design shops and see if they are throwing any away," she said.

So I did.


I was given six books by a very kind young woman in home-ware shop in Gretna. I only needed a few squares so the rest are going to WOW for an art project.

The blind was another problem. The old one was manky: little black dots had eked their way across the surface, and i couldn't get them off. It had been up there for ten years, and had only cost three quid at Ikea, I figured we were due a new one. So, off we went to  get a replacement; they had roller blinds, and slatted blinds, and all sorts of other blinds, but no roman blinds. And it was a roman blind I wanted.  I looked online, there were loads, but none were the width of our windows. I could get 90cm, 120 cm, or 60cm; all of which were far enough from the 100cm I needed they might as well have been ten metres. So I checked the cost of getting one made, and found we could go on holiday for that much, and we haven't had a holiday since we went to Cornwall for a week in 2007.

Meanwhile, I kept seeing things made of old burlap sacks (again on Pinterest): cushions, chair-covers, table runners. They all looked jolly nice but I had no idea what burlap was or where it could be purchased. So I googled and found out it was hessian, and after a few clicks of my mouse I found a website that specialises in upholstery material. They sold hessian by the metre, not only that they had some that was exactly the width of the window, and it was only £1.62 a metre. I ordered four metres.

One day one of us will remove the masking tape.

Today I took the old blind apart with the idea of using the bits of string etc to make a roman blind out of the hessian. I cut the required length and attempted to hem, remembered I couldn't sew a straight line and, thus, there was no way I'd be able to make those neat little rod pockets. And, what's more just trying would make the whole enterprise hateful. So I improvised.

Detail: I'm particularly thrilled with the purple dotted line, it reminds me of postmen.  

Once the wooden batten was in place – shove, shove– and the little eyelets were screwed into it, I threaded them with the string. Then with a big needle, just caught bits of the fabric with the string where I supposed the rods would be if someone else had made it. It's not perfect, and it probably won't last, but I for now I'm happy with it.

I still have a bit of grouting to do, but can't find the squeezy thing for getting it deep in the crevasses. I need to work out what to do with the bath's side panels (marine ply, not pretty), and order the flooring. So, I'm waiting for more inspiration and pay day.

Now I'm off in search of a musician, so I'll come visiting tomorrow.

*Women of the World: a local charity that helps women who find themselves living here far, far from home.

What is it to be?

It's been almost a month since my last post. And I've been wondering if it's time to let go of blogging. I started as a way of practising writing, almost five years ago, and I do that by just writing now. I teach writing, and I write. So I don't feel the same compulsion to write a blog anymore.

Most of the friends I've made here I see on Facebook, Pinterest, or Twitter, so I don't need it to keep in touch. And I just don't have time to read and leave meaningful comments on other blogs anymore. I have three jobs, a novel to redraft, and my house is falling down.

And yet...

I had some yogurt to use up, and wanted to practise shooting chocolate cake. So I invented chocolate yogurt cake.

I do have a new thing to practise. I am besotted with my camera (remember, Bob, my son, gave it to me for my birthday?). When I'm not doing work/writing related things, or trying to shore up the pantry walls, I most often have my camera at my face, usually aimed at something edible. I cook, I shoot, I eat. Cooking and baking have always been the way I recalibrate, and now the camera adds an extra dimension. It's turned kitchen activity into more of a challenge, and thus more fun, more rewarding.

Panzanella, perfect when you have a tomato and stale bread glut

But I'm not a brilliant photographer. Not appalling either, just not practised – I haven't put in my ten thousand hours yet – but I'm improving and recently a local restaurant to let me pay in photographs for a couple of meals, rather than the more usual money. I had loads of shots of their food because I like it so much I spend a lot of time there. They wanted to get a website up, and they needed pictures for it, so we did a spot of bartering.*

I don't suppose Nigella Lawson will be calling me to snap the pies for her next book. But as I don't need another damn job (at the moment. I can hear my husband muttering about economic realities) it will be quite nice to keep this as play. You learn more by playing, once something becomes work you stop exploring,  I do anyway. Work seems to create stresses which change the whole dynamic. I start focussing on time, and 'product'. And the product never seems to be able to be made good enough in the allocated time.

So, perhaps this blog will morph into a place for me to practise my photography. Scary enough to make me really consider what I'm doing before I share, but not stifling like work can be. Play, but public.

P.S. Blogger has completely changed since I last visited, and I seem to have inadvertently done something that's changed everything!


*Most, but not all the photographs on the site were taken by me.