Category: Serendipity

Pandemic Pondering#152

On By theoldmortuary.designIn art, Nature, SerendipityLeave a comment

The Art Group prompt word takes @theoldmortuary to some interesting places. Who doesn’t love a landscape?

My thing for years has been abstract landscapes. For this blog I plunged into my ideas and inspiration file.

I am intrigued and galvanized by nature’s ability to always overwhelm the constructs that man creates or just change the way things look. In doing so there is often unexpected beauty.

The dunes suffocating a beach hut at Wells-next-the-sea, Norfolk.

Here is an urban reclamation. Tarmac in Dulwich Park being broken up by tree roots and covered by autumn leaves and other natural detritus.

@theoldmortuary. The Smith Family Collection.

Nature is not exactly reclaiming this wall, but the Landscape Street Art is so famous as a site for Instagrammers that it is being worn away by sweaty hands and carefully posed leaning. This picture was taken some time after it was painted but before it became insanely popular as an Instagram background.

Alex Croft painted this as a commission for Goods of Desire. Countless Instagram photos feature this slowly fading wall.

©Instagram

Closer to home our century plus garden wall looked like a hedge as ivy took control.

It took quite a bit of effort to bring it back to wall status.

Next up 2 beaches slowly consuming man made structures.

And finally some box fresh images taken on Monday evenings combined swim and dog walk adventure.

A landscape shaped by the sea. Even if you visit this beach every day it will always be different.

Harlyn Bay, Cornwall

Pandemic Pondering #145

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It was all going so well. Pairing Ponderings with the Art Group Prompts. I even felt a little pride that I had knuckled down to prompts after my Prosecco fueled outburst. Then perspective got in the way. I got a bit giddy with excitement and the days and prompts got muddled.

Today at Drawn to the Valley is a fallow day. No prompts while my muddle of Perspective/Moor/River prompts gently and organically settles itself.

By way of apology I posted this image on the Instagram page of Drawn To The Valley.

I’m sure it was the excitement of Perspective that threw me off course.

The plan is pretty simple.

Blogs are written one day in advance to be posted anytime after midnight BST.

A prompt is posted on Instagram on the same day with a similar theme inspired by the prompt word at 7 am .

I’ve no idea how I got into such a pickle but it so happens that Pickle accidentally became the theme of my day. Late in life and in Pandemic Ponderings I have discovered the joy of pickling with a sweet brine.

Pickled grapes have been the excitement of the weekend. Today beyond my Drawn To The Valley prompt pickle I have pickled in sweet brine a combination of Padron Peppers and grapes. Pushing further the flavour combinations of sweet/acidic with some heat.

Pandemic Pondering #143

On By theoldmortuary.designIn SerendipityLeave a comment

Woo Hoo. The Art Group Prompt- Word, are we really only on day 9, lands like a gift in Ponderings.

We have already established that I was a nerdy child.

Reasons in no particular order

An ‘Only’ child.

Precocious reader.

Undiagnosed Synesthete.

Young, clever,working- class parents.

Older than normal for the time Grandparents. Much more normal now. Children seen but not heard style of granparenting.

There is my first use of perspective. Giving you an insight into my little nerdishness. The ponder that follows is a different perspective.

When I was 5 or 6 the ‘seen and not heard’ grandparents gave me this little book.

Its in a pretty sorry state now but when I dug it out this morning it made me very very happy.

I swallowed everything this book had to teach me.

Here is my favourite page.

When I looked at it this morning it was like meeting an old friend.

This knowledge tucked, into a head too young for it, did not do me any favours. The undiagnosed Synesthete was a tricksy old thing to deal with during my formative years. I never quite fitted into the herd requirements of education and although I could adapt and thrive there is always the feeling of being on the peripheral edges of any group activity. Like everyone that enters higher education I encountered reading lists which I diligently read, but I’ve found the books just peripheral to the reading lists were the ones that have formed my personal perspective of stuff that is important to me.

While searching for the delicious book on Drawing Houses by Sydney R. Jones I chanced upon some other fabulous reads.

Art History and Theory.

Life the Universe and managing awkward buggers and situations.

I’m not sure if Edward Dr Bono is fashionable or current right now. I once worked with his nephew who thought I was mad to love this book. Mad or not it has got me though some awkward moments with my integrity intact.

Understanding minds that are wired up just a little differently.

Finally story telling.

My blog is informed by all these books and many more. What I love about blogging is that it is so simple.

Think about something.

Write about it.

Enjoy and do the research in which ever way you can.

Reference, credit and share without ever having to worry about the Harvard System.

Even writing ‘ Harvard System’ brings me out in a little sweat.

Freedom is my perspective on the merits of blogging.

Pandemic Pondering #135

On By theoldmortuary.designIn Family, Gardens and gardening, Serendipity2 Comments

August 1st 2020.

For a month Pandemic Ponderings will be slightly controlled by the prompt list that my art group, Drawn to the Valley is using to inspire a response from members on Instagram and Facebook during August.

As you know from PP#133, I am slightly churlish about prompts but am choosing to see this as a creative challenge not only for art but my creative writing/social history Ponderings.

#1 Gardens

About two and a bit years ago garden design @theoldmortuary took on a new angle when we had to make it safe for an anticipated grandchild.

At the time that little family were living in Hong Kong so we had time on our side for alterations to the structure of the garden.

Then with great excitement they returned to Cornwall to live and our garden plans were properly tested and found to be pretty exciting for someone under two.

Then the Pandemic hit and she couldn’t visit. Then the Pandemic hit in a different way and they have had to return to Hong Kong.

Here she is inspecting the garden for herself, from above.

Then she required a meeting with the Head Gardener to discuss changes and improvements required for when she is able to visit again.

By embracing prompts I have been able to explain in a gentle way why we’ve been a little sad for a few months.

In the future the little person will know that she was loved and we were sad to see her go in 2020.

I’m looking at prompts in a new way let’s hope I am not a recidivist and return to my grumpy prompt hating ways.

For completeness sake here is the picture I’m going to pop into Instagram for the Garden prompt.

Dead heading into a turquoise bucket.

Pandemic Pondering #134

On By theoldmortuary.designIn SerendipityLeave a comment

Making Hay while the sun shines, part 2.

My apologies for the late arrival of today’s blog. After months of insomnia I was able to sleep last night. The usual time for tweaking and posting the next days blog was used for sleeping.

This morning was always going to be busy with good things. An early morning dog walk followed by a swim in the sea. The dog walk gave me this revised blog title.

Our local nature reserve is having a second hay harvest only a couple of weeks since the last.Today was always about making the best of things. We’ve had a sad old week which I’m sure I will touch on in various future blogs. So our is a metaphorical ‘ Making Hay While The Sun Shines’ kind of day. It turns out that is is also an actual Hay Making day.

The early dog walk was planned to facilitate an early swim with some old friends, pre 9am at Cawsand Beach. We found a quiet, almost Mediterranean corner of the beach to swim from.

The access to the sea was easy but very definitely more Cornish than Mediterranean, as was the sea temperature.

We had a fabulous swim, completely life enhancing and happiness creating. Followed by coffee and breakfast in our little cove. Emerging from our quiet spot there was very quickly signs of things to come!

The beach ahead of us was crowded even at 10 am.

Trying to get home involved an almost 10 mile traffic jam or a half hour drive to a ferry with a half hour wait.

Obviously from the picture you can see we chose the ferry.

This was a difficult decision for all @theold mortuary. A much loved family member was killed on the road to Torpoint and we’ve not ever travelled that road since. Some tears were shed.

South East Cornwall is full to the brim with people and traffic. Time to get back to part of today’s original blog.

The only link I can find is friendship.

Apparently government guidelines suggest that gatherings of 30 people are acceptable, with appropriate social distancing. Even with new additions I’m not sure I could gather 30 friends together and certainly not 30 family members. So once again I am unable to comply with new government guidelines. Meeting with a lower number of people suits us just fine. 30 seems giddyingly too many.

Just before lockdown I met two women. One at an art gallery and the other at a gym. Lockdown created a unique time and space to grow new friendships at a distance, we have also rekindled our old friendship with our swimming friends and nurtured existing friendships with the gift of more time. I’m not sure quite why the pandemic promoted the ability to speed up the cementing of really solid and valuable friendships both old and new, it’s a lovely positive in puzzling times.

I suppose that is something to ponder on!

The pictures below are lovely gifts that arrived this week from the Art Gallery friend and the Gym friend.

Lovely bursts of colour from flowers and crocheted bunting.

The pandemic has taught us to value friends and family and everything closer to home. It is a lovely feeling.

Pandemic Pondering #133

On By theoldmortuary.designIn SerendipityLeave a comment

Some days, pondering takes place beyond the blog.
This morning I was pondering or puzzling over a conundrum of my own making. Prosecco was involved.
I’m running the social media presence of an art group throughout August.At an informal planning meeting, I may have drunk a little prosseco.
At the meeting we were planning the August social media activity. I am not enlivened by prompts.In the art group world, prompts can be considered- helpful, inspiring, bonding, stimulating. I find them the reverse, Stifling, controlling, enervating .

Prosecco led me to be particularly blunt about prompts. Understandably, after I left, the others ignored me and went on to plan prompts.

Suddenly this morning I realised the prompt hater (me) would be managing a month of prompt related posts.

Not awkward at all.

Luckily I caught a programme on the radio. Serendipity had struck. the dogs are big fans of BBC Radio 4.
I caught them engrossed, listening to a woman talking about being creative.

In half an hour she cured my awkwardness over prompts. She is someone who embraces and creates from uncertainty.

I completely reccomend sitting down and listening,

30 minutes of down time listening to someone so much better than me at expressing a love of serendipity, or uncertainty and how it can be a positive thing

https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m000l7zh

More importantly, while listening to Caoilinn a lovely way of coping with prompts has revealed itself. I will embrace my awkward and consider the unwanted structure of daily prompts as my uncertainty and some days even use the prompt to inform and structure the blog.

These two morning events and the bees on the Artichokes are a fine example of a blog falling, unexpectedly into my head and then into the blog world.

Pandemic Pondering #129

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Accidental Christmas in July.

Today we hosted a family gathering and at one point the impromptu junk band started playing a Christmas tune.

I joked that it was like Christmas in July in the U.S, which we had experienced once . TV channels playing Christmas films, large family gatherings in parks. At the time it was explained to me that sometimes families who are widespread across the U.S have trouble getting together for actual Christmas because of extreme wintry weather. It all seemed pretty sensible to me.

Discovering that Saturday was actually the 25th of July and that we were having a family gathering with too much food and the obligatory walk prompted some pondering and research.


https://lifejourney4two.com/christmas-in-july/

The internet gifted me the above article that didn’t list the weather as a factor in the U.S but did baffle me with the information that Christmas in July is actually a thing in the U.K.

Not anywhere near me at any time ever!

I completely get the Southern Hemisphere thing. The need to celebrate/perk up the midwinter season was understood by primitive man and just hijacked by Christianity with some judicial juggling of dates.

The link below really takes Christmas in July seriously.
https://www.courierpostonline.com/story/life/2020/07/22/25-ways-celebrate-christmas-july-2020/5427258002/

After reading this I realised our accidental gathering was pretty amateurish. We do have solar powered lights for the summer season so I’m including these in the blog to give us a little more authenticity.

Also accidentally some sunflowers were bought which is a great way to end both this blog and retrospectively enhance yesterdays.

Time to start getting Christmas in July Boxing Day organised…

Pandemic Pondering #128

On By theoldmortuary.designIn SerendipityLeave a comment

Pondering on Sunflowers and wondering if I peaked in Cuba.I took this photo in 2016 in a Catholic Church in Havana, Cuba.Unusually for sunflowers I find this image melancholy and I love it all the more because it subverts the usual feelings evoked by sunflowers. I’m pretty certain I will never take a better photo of sunflowers. I should probably stop trying.This is another favourite, a sunflower next to a table light , artfully abstract, I like it but I don’t love it.Adoration, loyalty and longevity are the symbolic meanings attached to sunflowers in Western culture and in China good luck and lasting happiness .In Cuba, where my favourite picture was taken, the sunflower has a unique cultural significance. The sunflower is offered to the Virgin of Charity or Cachita as the mother of Jesus is informally known. Digging a little deeper the offering of sunflowers is a fascinating blend of worshipping girl power. In the Afro- Cuban belief system that is part of the Yoruba based religions, sunflowers are offered to Oshun who is an Orisha or spirit. She is a river goddess associated with divinity,feminity, fertility,beauty, freshwater, wealth and intimacy.The Virgin Mary in Cuba is habitually wearing a dress of sunflower yellow.Who knows why these flowers were left in a church, one of the many reasons I love this picture is the unpretentiousness of the bunch of flowers and that the imprint of the person who left them is still seen in the crumple of the newspaper used to wrap them.The blend of Christianity and Yoruba are held together in this simple bunch of flowers.The same theme can also be glanced in this Cuban dance.

https://youtu.be/2yFUouzE7Yk

Pandemic Pondering #123

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100 WordPress readers for the blog. I know it’s nothing compared to hugely popular blogs, but 100 people who are happy to read along on the pondering journey of someone insignificant, who just enjoys writing and connecting, is thrilling!
I was pondering the longevity of Pandemic Ponderings when I remembered one of my favourite books, ‘The Long Weekend’ by Robert Graves. It is a social history of the interwar years.

I wonder if we are entering a Pandemic ‘Long Weekend’ in Britain. Restrictions of the draconian type are being lifted and bits of life are returning to some form of normal. @theoldmortuary lives a more resticted life than the government suggests whilst still connecting with family and friends. We are mindful of the Second Wave of the pandemic which could start anytime between August or October depending on who you talk to.
So I will ponder on through the Pandemic ‘long weekend’ and into the second wave taking at least 100 of you with me.

On with the Sunday blog.
Two quotes landed in my social media feed today. They are properly robust pieces of secular writing with not a hint of whimsy, new agedness or religion.

I love them both. They need no explanation, but I would say they represent quite accurately my attitude to life.

Time to catch up on 3 regular topics in the blog.

The first dahlia of Pandemic Pondering #120 is the only Dahlia still. This morning he was looking gorgeous but as you can see from the photo, protecting him from slugs and bugs comes at a cost. He cannot live out in the green areas of the garden but has to live on the decking area where domestic life happens. Here he is this morning amongst the drying washing.

This evening he is still wide awake at sunset.

Our fitness regime, at home with Joe Wicks on YouTube continues, and has often had a mention blogwise but after more than 18 weeks of exercising at home we are addicted to having a velvet cushion for our aching knees. Surely all gyms could provide such comfort.

And finally we did our regular walk around Sutton harbour and the Barbican in Plymouth. Our regular haunt of Jacka Bakery was enhanced today by having some of our lovely family in it.

Sunday pondering, a little bit deep, a little bit superficial. Thanks for being 1 in 100 xxx

Pandemic Pondering #122

On By theoldmortuary.designIn SerendipityLeave a comment

Blogs written on a Saturday sometimes suffer from a little too much input…

Saturday started early for us, Hugo and Lola were booked in for the early slot at the groomers. After dropping them off we parked up at the National Trust car park early enough to be rapped on the knuckles by a diligent National Trust employee telling us off for parking overnight.

This view was our reward for being early birds. Eggs and bacon cooked while overlooking Wembury tasted fabulous.

Meanwhile Miss Lola was being pampered and featured on the groomers Instagram feed. Hugo declined to pose.
https://www.nataliesdoggrooming.co.uk/

She was obviously feeling competitive with Miss VV who appeared on the Cornish Lavender Instagram feed, this morning.
https://m.facebook.com/CornishLavender/

Grooming exhausts the dogs so a quiet afternoon was planned, a bit of domestica followed by some internet shopping was the height of planned excitement.

A quarter of British women buy their underwear from Mark’s and Spencer. We are in that 25%. The pandemic has not been kind to the underwear drawers. Without regular grazing in the lingerie department of M and S shortages have occured.

Internet shopping failed us today. The website was irritatingly erratic. However the local store had increased its opening hours so a very much unplanned adventure into post lockdown clothes shopping occured.

Its strange shopping in a familiar store with Social Distancing restrictions. By waiting until the early evening we missed all other shoppers. It was a really pleasant experience. Underwear was purchased and our reward for a first Pandemic clothes shopping expedition was a walk at the Royal William Yard, after a few hours rest, post pampering, the dogs were also ready to strut their fresh haircuts.
https://royalwilliamyard.com/

A box of chips was a treat for us all.
http://www.thehookandlineplymouth.co.uk/

Saturday blogging, it writes itself.