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.
Pondering on a Sunday is not always relaxing. This picture was taken when the day was very fresh. Ripe you might say , but as I write this the rain splatters regularly on the roof and the day is blowing out grey and grumpy. I never quite know how I feel about summer rain especially on a day that showed such early promise.Today I’m pondering the ineffectual way the English language has for describing the actual lived experience of summer rain. On the whole it has whimsicle or romantic descriptives.Soft, Shower, Precipitation.For a start there is the disappointment that it’s happening at all, no summer activity ever was enhanced by rain and yet there is no negative word for its arrival or its effect on life.Storms, Gales, Tempests, Hurricanes are all words for rainy weather in the three other seasons. But they don’t work in the summer. Squalls sort of fit the summer rain brief but there is no energy in that word to reflect my anymosity to the wet stuff in summer.It’s a limp word that gets no sympathy.” How was the summer fete?”” A complete wash out, there were squally showers”There is no dynamism in that statement.” How was the summer fete?”” A complete wash out, there was a tempest!”So much more impactful but who would ever say that.
So there we are a blog without end. A feeling of frustration that no English word quite sums up the annoyance of summer rain.
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.
Full moons and quarter moons could be made, but they don’t have intriguing shapes for small hands.
Kyknos Tomato Paste is our favourite tomato cooking ingredient and the tin is very high quality, so robust enough to make a very fine cookie cutter in times of Pandemic resticted shopping.simply by removing both the top and bottom with a can opener.
Don’t be tempted to upgrade the bread , posh bread gives tatty edges.MethodButter 3 slices of bread.Spread cream cheese on 3 further slices of bread.Sandwich one buttered and one cheesed piece of bread together giving you 3 cheese sandwiches that are uncut.
Stage one cut a circle or full moon out of one of the sandwiches, repeat as necessary with the other sandwiches……………………………
Stage two, cut out two more crescents out of the remaining sandwich………………………..
Stage three cut two more smaller crescents out of the full moon/ circle shape. This miraculously will leave you with a waxing or waning Gibbous…………………………………
Pack moons into a sandwich box.
Lunar loveliness for adventurous picnics.
Today is the day in our corner of South East Cornwall. The Artichokes have burst forth their pollen coated flowers and bees are all over the place, apparently this is a buff bottomed bee. There were many bees of buff bottom fame.
Wikipedia suggests they are called White Tailed Beewhich is far less exciting.What is exciting is that we also had a Cornish Black Bee.
The Artichokes are a gorgeous blaze of hot summer pink at the moment. They will get bluer in a day or two, some summers they deepen to a Klein or Majorelle Blue.When the Artichokes get bluer they tend to attract red-tailed bees. Something to look forward to later in the week.Meanwhile back to Blousy. I’m not sure Artichokes quite fit the bill.
But they do have an essence of blousy. If an artichoke walked into a bar it would expect to be noticed. Not because of the unusualness of a walking artichoke obviously, but because it has a provocative way about it, it looks like a good- time plant, the plant that knows where the after party is and is confident it will brazen its way passed the bouncers into the VIP area.Very Impressive Plant.
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