Sunday and the heatwave continued. After a sweaty day in the countryside we returned home for a late evening swim in a bay filled with the beats of the last DJ set at the Drakes Island festival. This morning the sunrise and dawn chorus are in the exact same spot with a cool breeze and cooler water.
All the same colours, just spread out differently
It has been a giddy weekend of live music.
Off to our local theatre to see The Tina Turner Musical. We also have tickets for Hamilton.
Then a very hot day in our yard listening to, and feeling through our bones a Drum and Bass festival which was being held on Drakes Island.
Then to finish off, live music from the Barracks. Who wouldn’t want to listen to a tribute band playing The Killers and Kings of Leon and any other band of that genre and era until 1:30 am. It was too hot to sleep, so roll with it in a comfy chair with a cup of tea. I have had worse experiences at actual festivals.
All punctuated with swimming in the sea. Very cool.
When your back yard feels like this at 9 am and the sea is just 5 minutes away it would be silly not to swap.
Of course even at 9 am the swim zone is busy, but the steps to this aquatic spot are a little bit concealed.
I can’t say we had this to ourselves, maybe 20 or so people found their way here in the hour or so it took for two separate swims and dog care in the shade. Seeking shade at 10am is the behaviour of holidays, not quite normal for our tiny part of Devon. Long may it last.
I was never sure where today’s blog was going and even now, with one sentence done, I am not fully certain. This is a talking and painting sketch. If the hair were grey and the face less youthful it could be me in a pondering moment. I deliberately chose the colour palate of the Studio floor.
Because I was planning to superimpose a photograph of the floor onto the sketch.
But plans, as we all know,are sometimes upended. While painting my peaceful woman I learned that the studio space I was painting in will close in six weeks time. After painting in and around these buildings in the Royal William Yard for 30 years my odd little sketch might be my last painting in these buildings. Suddenly I thought I had better make this sketch a little more significant. I have always wanted to paint an enigmatic woman in the style of Vladimir Tretchikoff
So I did some digital tweaking and added some blue to her face and legs.
But that was all a bit flimsy so I traced over my quick sketch and then did some mark making in response to the actual sketch and with some reference to Tretchikoff ‘s fabulously ornate collar. Tricksy on someone who is naked. I also wanted just a scintilla of sadness. The loss of creative spaces is a somewhat sad and mournful moment.
Digital tweakery gives so much choice. But I think I am going with the darkest one. Do you agree?
Then an afternoon of more painting. Maybe she is finished now and less gloomy.
Quite a giddy day today. An early trip out in a city that has free parking for three hours in some places. I registered my car number plate. Logged that my parking was up at 11:55 and went about my trivial business. Only to find this ‘Have a nice Day’ tucked under my windscreen. Who knows what has gone wrong but that is for me to sort out but, the very obvious ‘Please Recycle’ that amused me. Should I find some other hapless parker to receive my fine?
The bag itself had not been sealed so I have a small snack sized bag to refill with biscuits or a small piece of fruit. The possibilities seem endless. If only the recycle sign on food wrappers was quite so obvious.
Giddy has been the word of my last 24 hours. Yesterday I broke my own rule of not drinking caffeinated drinks beyond 12 noon. Gloriously tasty coffee fueled my natterings with someone I met recently who grew up in the same small market town that I did. We went to the same Primary and Secondary Schools. She is a little older than me but we know so many people in common and used the same book shops, coffee bars and clothes shops. Buying our first Levi’s in the same shop in Sandpit Lane. Two hours of nostalgia and the swapping of names familiar to both of us. I checked a map on my return and felt happy that Faggot Yard, a location on my bus route home still existed, we had mentioned that. How funny that two women so deeply embedded in the Essex countryside for 20 years should have floated off from the place of their genetic history and laid anchor after our working lives are over in the port city of Plymouth. We were both aware that our choices of careers would probably not allow us to stay in Essex for ever but also that parts of us will always regret that. What a joy to have met so far from home.
The insomnia caused by my coffee intake, entirely deserved, was full of a lovingly recalled nostalgia.
And now to appeal against that parking fine and find something really jazzy for that recycled bag to do.
What could you let go of, for the sake of harmony?
Sharing my opinions, is something I am willing to withhold for the sake of harmony. As long as I value the harmony I am preserving. But there are times when you just have to cast harmony to the wind and fly an opinion up the metaphorical flag pole to catch the same wind. Opinions are like the devices put on beaches to keep the sand in place.
Sometimes they work, other times they don’t.
And sometimes, for the sake of harmony, opinions are just not required. There is a path to harmony without them.
What’s your definition of romantic?
My mother, who was in most ways a very pragmatic person, had a guilty secret. She loved a romantic novel.
I have inherited her pragmatism but not her taste in books. Romance books are not my thing unless the romance is just one facet of an engaging narrative. Romancing, romantic gestures etc, just feel a little icky and coersive in specifically romantic novels. There is nearly always a power imbalance or jeopardy involved in the interactions between the people involved, there would be no story without such things.
However, as a woman whose glass is habitually half-full there must be a huge dose of my mothers love of romance residing in my soul, because life is sometimes shitty and yet I always try to find something positive in whatever situation.
The tidal pool was my destination for the morning dog walk and later I swam from the beach beside it.
For both visits it was rather a seaweedy experience.
But my glass-half-full, romantic head will only ever remember a beautiful morning walk and a delicious lunchtime swim, not the weed that made the pool unusable and stuck on my skin. Romance is seeing beyond irritation, embracing the moment and finding the golden nuggets in every experience. However mad that seems.
Not paying too much attention to the seaweed of life.
Harold S Kushner* emphasized the importance of finding good in every situation, stating, “If you concentrate on finding whatever is good in every situation, you will discover that your life will suddenly be filled with gratitude, a feeling that nurtures the soul,”.
*
Soul nurturing, that is pretty romantic in my opinion.
For tide-time reasons we have moved to another bay for our evening swims this week. The peaceful arrival of a Tall Ship was in marked contrast to the business- like Naval vessels or Ferries that keep us fascinated at Firestone Bay.
Mount Batten was a prehistoric trading port, dating back to the Iron Age. It has been a key location for the defence of Plymouth and was an Air Force Base where Lawrence of Arabia was stationed. It has, over time, developed into a water sports hub since the Air Force moved out. All a bit hotch potch with no clear development plan. The area is currently in the process of being upgraded and made more attractive to tourists and visitors of all sorts. I suspect I have never mentioned it in a blog but it is a regular spot for us to dog walk and sometimes camp overnight. Free parking by a beach is always a good thing.
The sea temperature this week is a balmy 16 degrees C. Last year the waters of Plymouth Sound never reached such heights, even during August or September so to do so by July 1st is quite lovely.
Another lovely thing is to swim , drink a cup of tea and then go straight to sleep after a gorgeous sunset. No shower, just lovely salty skin and slightly damp hair. The damp dogs are less appealing.
We popped to a coffee shop and bakery during the weekend drizzle. Slightly damp, the outdoor, rustic table showed signs of many a coffee spill. A hard working piece of wood, but nothing like as hard working as this similar looking piece of wood which I photographed supporting the jetty for the Statten Island Ferry in New York.
Decades old wood still working hard, long after its life as a living thing is over.
And now just bystanders to coffee and commuters.
Interesting though that if I digially abstract the cafe table the image can look exactly like a forest clearing.
Nature is a wonderful thing.
In other news I am continuing with my Glastonbury supported summer clear out. Doing the non day to day Domestic Admin that builds up behind the scenes.
To be frank, on day 3, I am at the point with my domestic admin that I am beginning to feel lethagy.Not unlike attending an actual music festival, I don’t much care who is on the stage I just want to lie in my tent and commune with nature,I am done with the whole thing. The summer clear out is over for now. Who knew domestic admin could fill a festival weekend quite so pleasurably? Until the moment when you know.
“I am so over this.”
What does a woman who loves music festivals do when she does not get a ticket for Glastonbury. This one plans a weekend of ‘jobs’ that are vastly improved by the background sound of the BBC livestreaming the music aspect of the festival.
And just like that the futility (utility) room was stripped out tidied and put back together. Our store of Covid restriction ‘essential’ baking and cooking ingredients have gone in the bin.
Farewell inert dried yeast and sumac + many others well past their best.
Hello tidied camper van too.
And as a reward, a little live night music. Shanty singing in a Cornish Village Hall.
A fabulous evening out with some of our bobbing friends and friends of friends.
And now on to Sunday, what satisfying jobs will we get on with to interesting music?
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