Author: theoldmortuary.design

theoldmortuary has been a blog for about five years. It has evolved into an almost daily event. Pondering on the things that are inspired by my daily life. Often mundane, sometimes repetitive I swerve from hyperlocal activity to big and small thoughts without blinking an eye. I am an artist and writer. My hometown is Plymouth in South West England, part of me will always be connected to London and another part loves to travel.

#1329 theoldmortuary ponders.

On By theoldmortuary.designIn Firestone Bay1 Comment
Summer Solstice 2025.

This is deliberately the last image of a weekend of Summer Solstice swims. It is an entirely composed and invented view of the Bobbers reality. Magic realism at its most local.

Magic realism is a literary and artistic genre that incorporates fantastical or mythical elements into a realistic setting. It blends the ordinary with the extraordinary, often blurring the lines between what is considered real and what is not. Originating in Latin America, particularly through the works of Gabriel García Márquez, magic realism explores the coexistence of the mundane and the magical, challenging conventional notions of reality. 

Here’s a more detailed explanation:

Key characteristics of magic realism:

  • Realistic Setting:The stories are typically grounded in a recognizable, everyday world with ordinary characters and situations. 
  • Fantastic Elements:Magical or supernatural events, creatures, or phenomena are introduced into this realistic setting, often without explanation or justification. 
  • Matter-of-fact Tone:These fantastical elements are presented as normal occurrences within the narrative, without the characters or narrator questioning their presence or logic. 
  • Symbolism and Metaphor:Magic realism often uses these elements as metaphors to explore social, political, or psychological themes, adding depth and complexity to the narrative. 
  • Cultural Hybridity:It often draws upon folklore, myths, and indigenous beliefs, blending them with Western literary traditions. 

Examples of Magic Realism:

  • Gabriel García Márquez’s One Hundred Years of Solitude:Features characters who levitate, have premonitions, and experience impossible events, all within the context of a Colombian family’s history. 
  • Franz Kafka’s The Metamorphosis:Gregor Samsa wakes up to find he has transformed into an insect, a fantastical event presented with a detached, realistic tone. 
  • Isabel Allende’s The House of the Spirits:Blends magical events with historical and political events in Chile, exploring themes of family, love, and political upheaval. 
  • Angela Carter’s The Bloody Chamber:Retells fairy tales with a feminist perspective, incorporating magical elements and exploring themes of sexuality and power. 

How is it different from fantasy?

While both magic realism and fantasy include fantastical elements, they differ in their approach to reality. In fantasy, the fantastic elements are central to the world-building and often require extensive explanation or rules. In magic realism, the fantastic elements are integrated into a realistic world, often serving as metaphors or symbols rather than the core focus of the narrative. 

The Bobbers started swimming at dawn and dusk on both the Summer and Winter Solstices during 2021.

In June 2021 we were still living under COVID Restrictions. A lot of Bobbers bobbed both morning and evening Bobs. We had not returned to real life.

4 years later and real life has returned. Bobbers are not as free to swim twice a day to mark the longest and the shortest day. But being there and not being there have some significance for all of us. Including the sun. In the real world the sun does not rise or set behind Drakes Island when viewed across Firestone Bay from Tranquility Bay beach.

In the real world only 2 Bobbers bobbed the morning shift and 5 bobbers, a dry bobber and a dog made the evening shift of 2025. Other swimmers raised the number to nearly a 100 in the morning and about half that in the evening.

But bobbers  and ex-bobbers, even non-bobber swimmers everwhere know how it feels to swim in this specific place and can imagine themselves there for those moments. And in everyone’s imagination the sun for sunrise and  sunset makes a perfect debut and finale just behind Drakes Island. Magic Realism is a powerful thing.

#1328 theoldmortuary ponders.

On By theoldmortuary.designIn Firestone Bay, Serendipity1 Comment

Summer Solstice started with a burst of colour over Firestone Bay as two bobbers and about 100 other swimmers took to the sea at dawn, the conditions were perfect.

Then the Solstice took a more practical turn as twenty volunteers, including two bobbers, took on the annual task of painting the Tennis Club Clubhouse with preservative.

Then it was back to the sea for more swimming at sunset.

So much exercise in one day and not a gym in sight.

A day painted perfectly.

Painting the Summer Solstice at Stonehouse Lawn Tennis Club.

In other news, the Solstice was celebrated in the local Tinside Lido.

©Tony Batty

And, of course, at Stonehenge.

Celebrated as a timeless place of worship with peace, love and traffic holdups.

#1327 theoldmortuary ponders.

On By theoldmortuary.designIn Serendipity, Summer1 Comment
Summer Solstice Double Dipping. A.M

For four years the bobbers have celebrated both Summer and Winter Solstices by dipping at sunrise and sunset. Summer takes more dedication with early and late starts. Winter takes more grit because the weather is disgusting and the water is very cold. Summer has not always been kind to us but in our collective memory the event is always magical. These two images of the early morning dip and the evening dip are entirely fake. Created by stitching three actual magical dips together. The location is accurate, as are the conditions and the swimmers. But they never actually occurred all at the same time in the same place so perfectly.

But in our recollections Solstice swims are magical. And I have the photographs to prove that.

Summer Solstice Double Dipping P.M

May Summer wrap her arms around you whilst the sun gently warms your soul.

The Solstice morning bob 2025

#1326 theoldmortuary ponders.

On By theoldmortuary.designIn Firestone Bay1 Comment

Another lonesome bob and a few minutes of tinkering with a phone camera and some Polaroid sunglasses and wet rocks.

Like all rocks, the rocks in our swimming zone are infinitely more colourful when they are wet and Polarised lenses enhance that effect.

This image is constructed by digitally double exposing two separate images a second apart and with some inevitable movement both me and an incoming tide.

What it demonstrates is exactly why this area is called Firestone Bay.

#1325 theoldmortuary ponders

On By theoldmortuary.designIn Bobbing, Firestone Bay, Swimming1 Comment

Lonesome Bobbing is not my normal way of sea swimming, but it is not unheard of. Bobbing with the Bobbers is the normal way of things for safety and sociability.  Is it even bobbing if you are alone?

I wasn’t even truly alone on my lonesome bob. Two neighbours and a dog,  were there before me. And thank goodness they were because in an attempt to capture a pet portrait I dumped my keys in the sea.

I was so busy doing the constricted-undressing- in -public towel wrestle I didn’t even notice their loss. When Tim noticed the brightly coloured key cutters bands and rushed in to rescue them. The photo is a fake, post-processing tweakery. They dried out quickly on a warm step,retrieving them I noticed the vivid colours ,created by bright, morning- sun and my sunglasses at a really low angle, close to the incoming tide. I popped my sunglasses over the lens of my phone camera.

Using my sunglasses as a filter.

Blurry but interesting, this impromptu image needed a little tweakery, but I might make a little polaroid filter for my phone camera for these brightly sunshiny days.

Lonesome bobbing, thankfully not truly lonesome.

#1324 theoldmortuary ponders.

On By theoldmortuary.designIn Serendipity, WordsLeave a comment
Our yard. Sharp Shadows from washing on the line.

Pondering, mulling.

Obviously I am an addicted ponderer. It is the beating heart of this blog and for me is both creative and endlessly fascinating.

Mulling on the other hand is a much less lightweight, pleasurable task. Mulling however is every bit as essential for me.

The two thinking techniques are closely related. I have always been a ponderer, I started young, in Reference Libraries. As I edged into adulthood, worries and problems could not always  be pondered into a solution. Sometimes more serious and better targeted thinking is required. Mulling moved into my life.

Recently, away from this blog I have had to do a lot of mulling on the behalf of an organisation that I help to manage.

My Mulling team, confidentiality guaranteed.

All organisations, whatever their title are essentially about people.  My recent mullings have taken me to places I never imagined I would need to explore. Despite the importance of mulling it uses much the same mental muscles as pondering. And for me the creative, familiar places where I choose to ponder have proved to be equally suitable for mulling.

1.Dull domestic tasks.

2.Dog walks

3. Yardening in the yard.

Staring at the laundry whilst thinking.

Just one stark difference between pondering and mulling.

Pondering rarely keeps me awake at night.

Mulling in the Dark. Weather permitting.

#1323 theoldmortuary ponders.

On By theoldmortuary.designIn Serendipity1 Comment
Summer Breeze makes me feel fine, blowing through the Holly Hocks of my mind.

Early summer is a fragile thing, a million things need to come together, in June, to create fragrant blooms and buzzy bees, with legs and fluffy bottoms all dusted with pollen. I love a Hollyhock but growing them eludes me. A minor success this year in the yard was quashed by the voracious appetites of our slugs and snails. Not for us the gentle hum of bees going about their business, just the inexorable chomp of a chorus* of slimy mouths feasting on our tender and tasty single Hollyhock survivor.

These Hollyhocks survive proudly, on the edge of a busy roundabout. Cared for by volunteer urban gardeners, they survive where mine cannot. Despite slightly obsessive attention. And yet, crazy, wild self-seeded Hollyhocks look down on me from cracks in rock walls and cliffs by the sea. Seemingly immune to the chomp of slugs and snails and happily hosting buzzy bees with dusty bottoms.

You may wonder where this ponder is going. The * is  the answer. A recording of a single slug having a chomp, imagine what a choir of them would sound like in a back yard.

* https://youtu.be/ByTLXNwe27M?si=7HdoA-ghu95wC4Qz

#1321 theoldmortuary ponders.

On By theoldmortuary.designIn Serendipity2 Comments

Our evening walk is never without a boat or two to look at . I have never had the opportunity to be a boaty person but there is something in me that loves to see boats all moored up and safe in their safe harbour.

Just for a moment, last night, the clouds, heavy with imminent rainfall, parted and let a shaft of setting sunshine illuminate these boats. A golden moment at the end of a day that has been filled with small and large golden moments. Chores achieved, chatter and cake. We went to a garden party, birthday celebration. The sort of party where guests contribute food to supplement the host’s main contribution. A glorious home-made version of an all-you-can-eat buffet. Conversations at this type of event are also as random and delightful as the food. Some are somewhat deep and others are fleeting and joyful, mirth making. Leaving you/me wanting more and chuckling randomly later. An all-you-can-talk-about conversational buffet.

Both the food buffet and the conversation buffet within a comfortable community, felt like a human safe harbour, a good place to be.

#1320 theoldmortuary ponders.

On By theoldmortuary.designIn Urban Jungle, Yardening1 Comment

We are a long way from the sterile, plastic- lawned, dog toilet yard that we bought four years ago. Our planned urban jungle has leapt into action this year. A warm dry Spring has been followed by a very wet early summer. This is the corner that overlooks a semi-subterranean garage and is about 4 feet above the back lane behind so it has the feeling of a very substantial balcony.

Like all good balconies there is an element of privacy whilst observing others. There is very little visual observation of other humans except an occasional shadow of an unknown neighbour. Deliberately oversized in these pictures because the shadow represents all the shadowy figures who enliven our viewpoint.

Aural overlooking, overlistening if you like, is the thing. The back lane is a stone-walled corridor that links a small car park with the road that leads to the sea or the city. We can hear but not see the people walking up and down. Swimmers chat animatedly, dog walkers are quieter. Largish groups of Royal Marines who occasionally run down the lane have two distinct personalities. One is heavy and mildly worrisome  when they are fully kitted up with guns and big boots. The other is more chattery and indeed fragrant as they do the same run in sports gear.

Evenings are quieter, couples and groups heading out to restaurants or the cinema.

But early mornings are my favourite thing. There is a sweet spot when all the singing birds are at their peak, just before the seagulls get up and move them all on.

A noisy corner of an Urban Jungle.