Category: Words

#1263 theoldmortuary ponders.

On By theoldmortuary.designIn Serendipity, Photographs, art, Words, Plymouth Sound, Plymouth, Stonehouse, Hybrid PrintmakingLeave a comment

Does every picture tell a story?

I think most do.

This one tells of the late summer clear up. All family guests have moved on to different holiday destinations and our home has eased back from peak occupation. The crocs belonging to three small girls are gathered in a bucket by the back door while the girls themselves are away on different holiday adventures.

Using a similar colour scheme I am trying to tell the story of a set of swimming steps that are much quieter this week now the heatwave has moved on.

I am at heart a story teller either with words or pictures.

A regular blog reader, who is familiar with these steps, said yesterday that I had made them look very posh. That was not the intention, but I agree. They may have been posh once upon a time but shabby shic is a better description now. Most of the time they are entirely tolerable and are regularly washed by incoming very high tides.

At night they can be a gathering place for  smokers of weed and men who like to do a wee. Not so posh then. Not so great as a swim destination either. Not  so great a picture.

But I don’t need to tell that story about these steps.

Years ago a little pair of discarded crocs by the back door of the actual Old Mortuary used to break my heart.   A small person and her family  had left us to live abroad. That would not have made a great story or a great picture.

3 pairs of crocs in a bucket is a much better story.

However in the interests of story telling I also wanted to show the earlier set of steps at the peak of the August heatwave. I am not interested in the crowds of people who used these steps recently just the steps as a metaphor for extreme atmospheric and radiated heat. Just too much heat.

The heat blistered out of the rocks at night. And the sea languidly lapping the steps, warmer than we have ever known. Not quite cooling enough perhaps. Oleaginous even.

A different colour scheme. A completely different story.

#1350 theoldmortuary ponders.

On By theoldmortuary.designIn pondering, Words1 Comment
A marvellous place to muse or mull. Or even ponder

Yesterday was a musing or mulling kind of day. Nothing serious, just a delicate or sensitive situation, tennis club based that needed good handling. I was extremely lucky to get a favourite swimming spot to myself so I could mull or muse uninterrupted.

A good overnight brought me some clarity for that problem. But then trivial ponderings made me wonder why I had not called my blog ‘theoldmortuary muses’ or ‘theoldmortuary mulls’

theoldmortuary ponders follows on from Pandemic Pondering. That title obviously had a time limit but on a writing course I was advised to leave the pandemic behind, before it left me behind. It was also suggested that I make my blog more personal. theoldmortuary is my creative space and although a pseudonym that feels pretty personal, not for a moment did I consider dropping the word pondering. Mull would never have been chosen but muses might have done.

I do wonder if I have rather devalued the essence of a ponder by pondering such trivial, benign, repetitive or quite frankly flimsy thoughts on a daily basis.

Muse does seem slightly more appropriate but for now, pondering will be the thought process. Leaving musing and mulling for more serious thought processes.

Back to to the swim where I mulled or mused a tricksy tennis problem. From my ridiculously elite swimming spot I swam to the very popular beach.

And then I swam back. This is a truly trivial,benign,repetitive and flimsy ponder.

But musing and mulling also occured.

#1413 theoldmortuary ponders

On By theoldmortuary.designIn Serendipity, Words3 Comments

Early morning dog walk for voting. So early that I had to wait for the coffee shop to open.

I rewarded myself with the laminations of a croissant.

I have a habit of voting early, having missed the vote once when I lived in Lambeth. I had left for work before the Polling Stations had opened and due to the unpredictability of working in Cardiac Cath labs arrived at the Polling Station with only a half an hour to go. Almost the minute I got off my train there was a strange vibration in the air. The Polling station was less than five minutes from the train station. There were outside broadcast camera operators and journalists and an enormous queue. Some sort of drama had occured and there were record numbers of voters. There was no way that everyone in the queue would get to vote and no chance that anyone joining the queue, like me, would get the chance. To queue, to make a point or not to queue. Either way I was denied my constitutional right.

The Lamentations of a choice, no croissants involved. The cafes were all closed.

#1409 theoldmortuary ponders

On By theoldmortuary.designIn Dance, Music, Words1 Comment

In the 1990’s I was a busy working mother of two, wishing that Plymouth was more like Brighton.

My Brighton life was mostly carefree. Plymouth was the settling of my new life,consolidating being a parent and doing a job that I didn’t care for to make parenting easier. The comparison was not kind to either city. In the 90’s two bands in particular kept me sane . The Verve, all dirgy, and melancholic and Daft Punk, Electronic Dance music with something extra

Plymouth was represented by the Verve.

Brighton got Daft Punk.

I love them both but Verve love is hollowed out . Daft Punk the love of escapism.

With tthe distance of time I can see that both loves have equal merit as do both cities

Which is a long preamble to natter  about a contemporay ballet I was intoxicated by last night.

Body and Soul by The English National Ballet.

Source: BalletcoForum https://share.google/tSHdWk7W0gCG1ra6s

Two distinctly different choreographed ballets that might seem, and were unconnected . Maybe a pairing not for anyone but to me they made perfect sense. Both hugely expressive pieces using gorgeous, perfect human bodies to unfold a story or a feeling. The music of Part 1 was not at all Verve like but Androgynous dancers performing such mind blowing emotion took me to that hollowed out place that I felt as a newish parent in a strange place. I had no care for the gender of the dancers, just mesmerised by the places they were taking my head too. There should be more words for erotica and sensual.

Or maybe completely new words that describe sublime pleasure of being cocooned in the moment of contemplation by writhing human bodies who are just there to make you think, nothing sexual or intimate. Just thoughts.

Part two was so much closer to my 90’s Daft Punk vibe and similarly thought provoking. It was by its nature, bawdier,closer perhaps to sensual and erotic. With May Day vibes of flesh and lust sanitised by white drone like and sexless creatures. Just there doing their thing  perfectly and simply to make us think.

Not knowing or caring what gender any individual dancer was, allowed for a huge amount of buttock envy. My goodness those dancers had the most amazing bottoms.

My head was quite properly blown. All that gorgeously stimulated thinking and some absolutely peachy bottoms. What a night out.

https://www.theguardian.com/stage/2026/mar/20/english-national-ballet-body-soul-review-sadlers-wells-london-kameron-n-saunders-proper-conduct-crystal-pite?CMP=Share_AndroidApp_Other

I am still thinking about it. Wondering at the ability to have my head completely taken over by movement and music. Loving the hollowed outness and the escapism in equal measure.

If only we could have two new words to express the joy of being made to think unexpected thoughts in a theatre by honed and expressive bodies.

#1395 theoldmortuary ponders.

On By theoldmortuary.designIn Serendipity, Words1 Comment

Yesterday I was seeking some quiet perfection at the Tennis Club. Quiet perfection was not available. The club was overrun by feral children and  some minor but sensible rules were being broken. But as I left, this beautiful Calla Arum Lily caught my eye.

On top of the feral children and minor rule breaking there had also been some mansplaining, which can irritate the tits off most women.

So not only was I not particularly relaxed but I was mentally very flat chested.

The day was not lost though, I discovered a new- to-me word.

In fact, as luck would have it, the father of some of the feral children had adopted a braggadocious tone when I remonstrated with one of the children who was climbing on the roof of the clubhouse.

” Oh don’t worry about that” he said braggadociously.

“They do far more dangerous things elsewhere”

Perfection

Perfection is not always what you seek but what is delivered to you.

I suspect my face may have not hidden all of my thoughts on his comment.

Moments later he offered me a cold slice of his left over Pizza.

I did not accept.

#1379 theoldmortuary ponders.

On By theoldmortuary.designIn Drear, Easter, Spring, Words2 Comments
A dreary valley in Spring

I first met the word ‘drear’ in 1977. Raymond Briggs used the word in Fungus the Bogeyman. A graphic story book.

Of course before that,the word dreary  was commonplace in my thoughts. Who could not have been young in Britain in the sixties and seventies and had the once a week experience of dreary Sundays. No shops open, no cinema. I could add to that no pubs/ bars open but I was too young for that and my grandparents owned a country pub so actually Sundays there were not so dreary. A time when a little more freedom was allowed without worrying about the paying customers or patients who attended their G.P in a curiously formal room at the front of the pub.

The word dreary has always made me feel a bit sad, melancholy even.

Taking the ‘y’ off  the end is curiously liberating for me. 

I can use the word drear quite happily as a descriptive and not feel plunged into a gloomy, fog-like head space.

A drear planting scheme.

The Spring of 2026 in the West Country has , so far, not failed to disappoint. It is drear but not dreary. There have been glorious bursts of sunshine but they are accompanied by colder than usual temperatures and are unable to sustain themselves for too long.

Yesterday we planned a Spring walk in cold sunshine. By the time we got to the location, drear had set in. We were not at all dreary though.

Just losing the ‘y’ makes my head so much happier. Drear has an acceptability that dreary will never have.

#1354 theoldmortuary ponders.

On By theoldmortuary.designIn Firestone Bay, WordsLeave a comment
Firestone Bay.

One of my digital photo manipulation apps has a new ‘Romantic’ filter. I never normally use just one app or just one setting,preferring to amalgamate different settings from different apps to create a more unique and interesting image from my daily walks . But ‘Romantic’ seems to be a bit of a wonder filter.  My daily walk never looks like this but there is nothing in this picture that doesn’t exist at some time of day or at some time of year from this viewpoint. Never, though all together. My romantic head conjures up something similar to this when I am away from home and imagining what our regular swimming beach looks like. The other thing I love about this ‘Romantic’ image is that someone wrapped up warmly against the cold and sitting enjoying a cup of coffee is obvious in this digitally enhanced image. I had completely missed them on the original photo. Are they reading or sketching?

How do I even feel about romanticising things as someone who believes that I am a pragmatist at heart?

A deep dive into quick AI definitions throws my pragmatist belief into a quandary.

Honestly who could imagine a filter causing so much thought. If only the app had called it a beautiful filter that would have been fine. I would have tried it the minute it appeared on the drop down menu, but the word romantic put me off for several weeks.

Just another pair of words for me to float between.

#1391 theoldmortuary ponders.

On By theoldmortuary.designIn dog walks, Words1 Comment

Last November I was given a rose for my birthday.

For some reason I just accepted the name without ever looking up its meaning . To be honest I thought it was rather a clunky name for something quite so pretty. Moving on to yesterday evening  when our dog walk took us to the furthest part of Devils Point and the Royal William Yard. There was a beautiful sunless sunset and this historic gas lamp had been fitted with a bulb that glowed with a warm light.

Only moments earlier at the top of the staircase I had seen delicious clouds basking in the light of the departed sun.

In a perfect world I would have been on this spot five minutes earlier. Those clouds deserved a visible light source. I stuck the two images and came up with this one.

I was never going to pretend it was genuine but felt it needed a name. Only to discover the French word for twighlight.

So , I am doubly educated . I no longer think my rose has a clunky name and I am quite delighted to realise  that I planted it , by accident, so that when it has grown the sun will set behind it. Both crepusculing together.

Crepuscule in Stonehouse 2025

#1377 theoldmortuary ponders.

On By theoldmortuary.designIn Words1 Comment

I am a lover of words. This morning I happily typed a word into Wordle, the New York Times sponsored word game.

https://www.nytimes.com/games/wordle/index.html

My answer was correct on the 4th attempt. The word slipped easily out of my brain and I shared my result with my Wordle Whatsapp group.

The word slipped out of my brain almost at the same moment I realised I had no idea what it meant and that I had certainly never used it in a sentence.

I have looked it up now and realised why I have never used it. The word has two uses, musical and psychiatry.

My head has always been full of random thoughts and ideas. Not archived or catalogued in any useful way.

My storage system for knowledge has two distinctive visualised locations. A smart office block where all the necessary and acquired knowledge for life, work and survival is stored. Calmly efficient, beautiful streamlined architecture where busy archivists work happily and effectively. Pulling out information as and when I need it.

The other location where all the fun and interesting, life enhancing stuff is stored is a warm and welcoming Town House with 4 floors. There are always comfy chairs , interesting rugs and warm fires near the haphazard shelves and overspilling store boxes. The archival system is managed by happy individuals who wear a lot of velvet and softly worn linen. Always smiling they serve tea and snacks while I patiently wait for an answer that I know is somewhere in their domain. Mostly they are as efficient as the streamlined, smart office block.

Sometimes however I am turned away from the cosy repository with the promise of an answer arriving later in the day. And so it does. Arriving gently, as if delivered by a silent hot air balloon or by a tiny feather caught in a summer breeze.

Puzzled by my inability to remember, I set off on another task only to be gently disturbed by the arrival of the random fact or piece of knowledge I required 3 hours earlier.

Below is the Wordle word of the day . Do not read on if my spoiler would spoil your day.

I now know exactly why Fugue was in the Townhouse and not the Office Block.

J.S Bach Toccata and Fugue.

I met this piece of music when I was under 6 and knew its name. Which I thought was exactly that, a name.

Like Tom and Jerry, or Laurel and Hardy.

In 60 years I had never given it a thought or a refile.

I absolutely understand both uses of the word.

But what is to happen to poor old Fugue, resting comfortably in a warm and cluttered townhouse of random knowledge for 60 years.

Is he, Fugue was always male, about to be rehoused in an office block of known and retrievable facts. Has he taken his last featherlight balloon trip into my thought processes. I suspect so.

Will Fugue the character be in a psychiatric fugue of his own.

I will allow him a free pass to either dwelling, I know where I would rather be.

#1318 theoldmortuary ponders.

On By theoldmortuary.designIn Words1 Comment

The thing I ought to have done today is to keep a better eye on my timekeeping. Primarily because poor timekeeping made me miss my hair appointment yesterday, and talking too much landed me in the most horrendous rainstorm. So today I ought to have kept my chatting a little more under control but today there were no appointments just domestic admin and cooking.  Things that ought to be squeezed into the spaces in between lovely wide-ranging conversations. And squeezed in they were, which makes the ‘ought to’ somewhat irrelevant. But there are days like yesterday when I ought to have kept an eye on the time. Missing a hair appointment is really very thoughtless. What is even worse is that an hour or so later I was telling a friend I had lost track of time and missed an appointment. She looked at me in horror and said.

“Oh my goodness , I shouldn’t be here either. I ought to be at a community thing”

When I was younger I certainly thought ‘ought’ and indeed ‘should’ were words of diligence rather than desire,but now I feel more kindly towards it. Ought is a word used out of respect. I can be flimsy about my own time keeping but not when it affects other people.

I also really like the idea of an Oughtobiography. An epic tale of all the things I ought to have done. There may be more blogs on this topic…