Yesterday I said that dog walking could be repetitive. But today blogging is repetitive. Yesterday I was out early to catch the dawn and today was the same, strengthened by the knowledge that yesterday, dawn was about the only time the sun showed it’s face.
Forder Creek, at dawn. A wonderful place to walk at low tide.
Penzance to Paddington.Paddington to Penzance
True to form the sun rose and was briefly beautiful but soon the ghastly greige of a West Country winter set in. My morning was filled with delivering this month’s books to the Bookworms reading group. Lunchtime however brought a very bright surprise. I went for a dog walk with a friend in Victoria Park, Plymouth, followed by an impromptu visit to a wonderful interiors shop. But it was the exteriors that chased away the greige of the day.
Dog walking can be repetitive, particularly the walks closest to home or favourites. London Park walks became meditative but also made me really appreciate the subtle way the seasons shift and change. Walks in Cornwall have a bigger diversity even if they all start more or less in the same area. In 12 hours I have done the same dog walk twice. Into the town and then off for a run by the river. I wasn’t lacking in options for other walks but I needed to do other things in the same location and not everything was open at the same times.
Last night’s walk was brightened up by our local towns festive project. Winter Wanderland. Local people and businesses were encouraged to make illuminated window displays, using sillouettes to brighten up walking about town, in place of the usual Christmas Carol Festival
The was no worry about avoiding crowds. We didn’t meet anyone else doing any winter wandering. Ours is not a town that gets giddy with excitement at the best of times. The promise of illuminated windows did not tickle anyone’s giddygland in this Tier 1 destination, despite many of the windows being really good.
Less than twelve hours later , nature threw a visual sillouette party of its own.
Still no giddiness or excitement or even any other people , but definitely something good to look at on a dog walk.
The Theft of the Family Baubles Yesterday saw the gathering of three friends for breakfast @theoldmortuary table. For those of you who have read the ‘about’ page of this blog will know the table is where many Ponderings start.
All three of us had rather sad tales involving the theft of our familial collections of Christmas decorations. I suspect it is unusual to have such sorry tales involving something as trivial as Christmas decorations but the triviality underlines the unkindness of people.
Memories for all three of us are triggered by Christmas decorations. As a collective group of women we have been robbed of Christmas decorations that we knew and loved as children. Between the three of us they represented memories from Woolworths, Hong Kong, Poland, Harrods and many unremembered locations and events , in age they possibly stretched back almost 100 years. The theft of them says so much about the character of the people who took them as their only true value is within the loving memories of family members. Sadly, they are likely to all be in landfill somewhere now, as detached from their memories they do become worthless tat.
I think, encouraged by this sad talk, we decided to mark 2020 with some new decorations. We were aiming for gaudy colours with maybe a hint of retro and perhaps a little bit tastelessness. These new additions illustrate this blog.
Several things revealed themselves to us.
Gaudy and tasteless is not a thing in 2020.
Woolworths has gone.
The first week of December is way too late to get peak choice in Christmas Bauble World.
Some stars look a little like a Covid-19 Virus.
And to those Bauble thieves in three different locations – we know where you live.
This is a picture of very happy artists. Only in 2020 could this be quite so exciting. Drawn to the Valley, Art Group have managed the almost impossible feat of arranging two exhibitions in the last two months.
Following on from the fabulously successful Butchers Hall Exhibition in Tavistock this happy group of artists set up the exhibition at Harbour House Kingsbridge this weekend.
One of the bodies of water I regularly walk along used to be known as Crimble Passage. That’s just as exciting as working near Grotto Passage!
That’s it I’m done for the day.
Cremyl Ferry crossing Crimble Passage
Crimble has in time changed to Cremyl. The tides and currents of The Crimble or Cremyl are complex and dangerous and give the land around which they swirl the name Devils Point. Conversely the beach close by where @theoldmortuary swim safely is called Tranquility Bay.
My first day back at The Box after Lockdown 2, and my first day in a new- to-me gallery.
I could give you the official description of Port of Plymouth 1 but yesterday for an hour or so I had a unique experience. The gallery was almost empty and I had the chance to explore it unencumbered with any responsibility for the well being of visitors.
The portrait above is of an anonymous fisherman, he is the human face of the character of this gallery. The gallery yesterday represented to me the biography of the city. Port of Plymouth 1 tells the story, the basis almost, of every other gallery in the museum. The sort of thing that might be written on the back of a funeral service booklet to give an over view of the deceaseds life. Of course Plymouth has not died and under current circumstances enjoys relatively good health.
I deliberately chose a man’s photograph because the gallery has a woman’s voice. Dawn French narrates two audio visual presentations within Port 1 and while you are in the space you are never very far away from her voice. This is a brilliant piece of gender balance because inevitably Port 1 is for the most part a man’s world. Not because women played no part in the history of Plymouth but because history has traditionally sidelined women’s contribution. It is only really the 20 th Century exhibits that begin to truly reflect the importance of women to the city.
As you enter Port of Plymouth 1 there is a massive 3D screen showing a film presentation of the developmental history of Plymouth. The film is one of the exhibits narrated by Dawn French. Currently with Covid-19 restrictions only about twelve people can view it at any one time, with so few people it is hard to gauge the impact but later in my morning a whole school group of about 40 watched it together and the impact on them as a large group was remarkable, when the museum can open as normal this will be a memorable group activity.
@theoldmortuary we are in the process of moving home. It was a little bit strange to view our proposed new location as history evolved over it and in the WW2 era bombs landed very close.
Ambient Lighting in Port of Plymouth 1 is subdued but the lighting of each exhibit is so beautifully done that even when it is full of people ( a future aspiration) it is really easy to concentrate and understand the significance of each exhibit.
This is the point that pondering has to stop, just like the Dockyard Gate photo above, the visitors started to arrive. There is loads more to talk about but visitor safety and smiling took over my time.
The first Christmas card of the season arrived yesterday. Thanks to our lovely friends ‘ The Hobbits of Cheam’ It features a robin and the toe of a lovely red wellie.
Wellies are a bit of a topic @theoldmortuary just recently. The wellies that took us from muddy park walks to commuting to work in London, on occasions, had a simultaneous death pact during 2020. Three pairs have hit the recycling bin in the last month. Two with leaky seams that worked OK in summer mud and were serviceable until faced with proper winter Cornish rain. The last pair, an incognito wellie masquerading as a Chelsea boot, developed an awkward fault. One of the soles started to take in water and mud . The fault was unnoticeable in fields or other grassy areas but the minute I strayed onto tarmac or any hard surface it made squishy noises and loud farty sounds . My feet were never affected and remained dry but sometimes the curious sounds startled passers-by. The sounds were not a good enough reason to recycle them but as the weather has got colder and we’ve needed some heating they have started exuding a range of smells as they rest in the hallway. Some smells are not so bad in a house in winter, warm earth or even mild vegetation smell and sound almost like a deliberately chosen room fragrance. But you don’t always know what is in the mud you’ve walked through. and sometimes the smell was more rugged. Clinical even, like a sigmoidoscopy room after a busy day or Accident and Emergency on a Friday night when a fighting drunk loses control of their bowels and creates a toxic cocktail of smells. The Chelsea boots had to go!
This wouldn’t really be a story but 2020 twists everything. Once the decision was made to ‘ let the Chelsea Boots go’ a fairly quick replacement was necessary. You would think replacing wellies would be pretty simple, but apparently during the run up to the storm that is ‘ Black Friday’ everyone had needed short wellies in a size 6 ( I need short wellies because my calves are a well rounded and substantial pair of muscles)
The only pair I could find that would fit the bill were a pair of ‘rugged’ ones from Kurt Geiger! Rugged or Chunky boots are this season’s big fashion news and if you are buying boots from Kurt Geiger they are going to have a stylistic edge. They look like the love child of a polyamourous coupling between a tractor tyre, Chelsea boot and builders safety boot conceived during Pride Weekend.
They neither leak nor smell and that is wonderful.
My thanks to the lovely ‘Hobbits of Cheam’ who sent us the first Christmas card of the season. They also very kindly wrote that these blogs are ” Keeping them going in 2020″ That is awfully big boots to fill and really lovely feedback. Hobbits you inspired this blog, I also can’t wait to see you on the other side and I hid your names in one of the paragraphs x.
Yesterday was a glitzy sunshine glazed day. It was my mother-in-law’s 90th birthday, which sadly, no one could share with her. Luckily I have a photo of her bathed in sunshine enjoying an afternoon tea a little while ago
Afternoon tea will be a fine way to celebrate when we can all socialise again. Perhaps for once she can celebrate her birthday in the summer.
My day was spent mostly on dull tasks but the bright sunshine forced me to have a bit of a tramp around a National Trust Property in the morning.
As so often happens a lovely empty bench forced me to catch a photo of it basking empty in the sun. The luxury of sitting on a bench and nattering to people is something I will treasure hugely when we get the freedom to do it again.
There were little hints that the festive season is getting closer.
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