Earlier this week we had the hottest day of the summer. One giddy day of wall to wall sunshine and no clouds. Over-excited media broadcasters called it a mini heatwave. It was just one day!
Not that we didn’t get a bit giddy and go for an evening adventure in the camper van and a swim at a different beach to our regular one.
A beach that is only dog friendly after 6pm in the summer. I suppose we imagined that we might be one of the few on the sand at 6. Not so at all, it was packed and it was only the long shadows of later on that chased people away.
Cawsand Bay was buzzing with happy people. Yachts and motor boats moored, some playing music as they prepared supper in their galleys. Even the wasp- like jet ski’s were silently bobbing on the waves just taking in the last heat of a lovely day.
However beautiful this spot is in summer we are far more regular visitors in the winter,when the dogs are welcome all day and we can be comforted by warm clothes and hot drinks. We should do this trip more often on summer evenings.
Where is the fun in an overused word when a rarely used word has been tapping at my brain for more than 37 years.
The term matrescence was created in the 1970s by an anthropologist, Dana Rafael who suggested the name for the period from conception to the child’s early years. She also suggested that matrescence was possibly a life long series of changes for women.
By the late eighties and early nineties there had been enough research for there to be a degree of knowledge around the changes that affected me, but the negatives, post partum depression, forced insomnia and exhaustion were quite rightly the headline issues.
Back to the odd question of the day and why I chose to subvert it .
Yesterday I went for an evening walk in a coastal graveyard, the under research or understanding of matrescence, a word that few people use, became a little clearer to me.
This is the backside of the grave of a woman called Jane who died in a small coastal community 200 years ago. Also listed on her grave were 3 of her dead infants, none of whom survived beyond 1 year old. The most recent infant death occurred 1 month before her own death. Her husband was also buried in the same grave but had lived a more normal lifespan. Just surviving childbirth was enough 200 years ago.
Even 100 years later things were not much improved in poor communities. But 50 years later in the 1970s, motherhood and infancy were not such a risky business and Matrescence got a name and some academic study.
Women and their babies stood a good chance of surviving and thriving, so the less critical to life changes, were being observed, considered and written about. Absolutely a good thing, but in 1970 Dana Rafael suggested that the changes were likely to be lifelong and that at key points puberty, menopause and later life women are likely to have more changes if they also have ongoing matrescence.
These 3 intersections of womanhood have barely been researched.
Around 50 years after Matrescence got a name, Dr Will Courtenay put Patrescence on the academic table. The effect of parenthood on men.
Now men have some skin in the game I wonder where the available research funding will go?
What does history suggest?
Pondering in a coastal graveyard, it makes me think. See link below.
We have empty bed syndrome. Our Grandchild quota has been cut by 2/3 over night. No longer a family all in the same post code and soon enough not in the same time zone.
Peace in our duvet as the sun rises. Somewhat artificially we have arrived in late summer by mid-August. The summer we prepared for is done, over for another year. Ahead is the bonus summer, the scrag end of summer admittedly, but one where anything might happen.
Because we have had our imaginations reset by a five year old and our joy in the mundane enhanced by the wonder of two under-twos.
A quiet duvet is just the start to new adventures.
I love the serenity of this image that I painted a couple of times about ten years ago. I rarely find peace with one of my paintings but wherever the two paintings are I hope their owners find serenity in this woman’s peace.
Serenity on a Sunday.
Below is my instagram reel featuring the Grandmothers Click Song
Wild camping with a five year old. Our plan was to park in a quiet corner of Mountbatten to give our 5 year old grandchild the chance to be immersed in Nature for 24 hours. What had slipped our minds was that a World Championship Sailing event was being held at our chosen destination.
Regardless we found a perfect quiet corner to camp and arrived just as the last races were being held. Tiny sailing boats competing in the early evening sun. The winners heralded with a klaxon call just beyond our bushes.
Our evening dog walk enlivened by the happy chatter of many different languages eager to party and then be on their way. Small boats packed away on trailers.
This morning we awoke to the graceful dance of maritime traffic going about its business in Plymouth Sound. After being lulled to sleep with the gentle thud of Drum and Bass at celebratory parties and International teams slipping away at midnight.
Wild camping, not as planned but wild and memorable in its own way.
What colourful nonsense is this Friday Blog? The end of a week when play has been at the heart of everything and soft play has been the giddiest of all the play events.
Soft play areas are vast creations of indoor multi-storey, multi-sensory ,padded, wipe clean climbing frames for the under tens. Our visit yesterday was to a Cornish Copper Mine themed one. Earlier in the week we were in soft-play Steam Train world.
Nothing about these places is subtle. They are loud, brash, palaces of pleasure and excitement. Adults use the crazy plastic construction in order to supervise their small people, but clambering and climbing over brightly coloured, soft shapes, with very little chance of physical harm is such a fun thing to do, it surprises me no-one has ever built one of these things to adult proportions.
Over-enthusiasm on my part has led to minor injuries in the past. Grown-up backs and knees complain mightily the next day. I kid myself that it is because everything is a little too small and awkward for me, but the truth is, I have circled the sun many more times than the under tens for which a soft-play zone is designed and I am not as pliable as I once was.
A well stocked cafe with good quality coffee and snackage soothed my aches and dried me off after a quite different sensory experience. Working Wi-Fi would have been advantageous, just for five minutes, for a brief phone call. Miners Play is in an area of Outstanding Natural Beauty and no phone signal. Staff were very helpful in pointing out the exact spot where a signal could sometimes be found in the middle of an outdoor field. Twenty minutes in the rain found me a signal,and with calls done I returned to coffee, a bacon sandwich and somewhat ironically working Wi-Fi.
Admin done I returned damply to my family. Still adventuring wildly,there was still an hour to go in our session. Small sweaty hands pulled me to enjoy their moments of triumphant clambering. Small sweaty hands. Nothing better
Texture and Context. Wandering around a favourite local tourist attraction, with small people, alters the context of my adult engagement with the place. On this occasion, Heligan Gardens near Mevagissy in Cornwall. Small people linger longer in places that I give less time to. But they also give me less time to gather information because their needs, interests and safety are less predictable than mine. I would love to be able to tell you which rare breed of donkey owns this beautiful fluffy ear. We visited her many times practiced the word donkey and moved on.
Similarly the Bronze Turkey.
We made animal noises in English and Polish. They are not the same.
And stare in wonder at a tiny fairy ring growing in a border.
But a small person version of a favourite place is not all hustle and bustle. I was left for ten minutes in the potting shed and again in the head gardeners office while playing hide and seek. Wonderful silent places where the illusion of stepping back a century or so is tranquil and authentic.
And where my pursuers are glimpsed through dusty old windows.
My fascination with bees is tempered by worrying if small fingers may try to touch a bee bottom. For once, a good enough photograph is the perfect balance of being a competent and trusted nana.
No bottoms touched.
The other thing busy days with small people affects is enough moments to summon up a blog. My apologies for yesterday, maybe I can crack out two today. Maybe not. But there are plenty more pictures to share…
An infinite amount of things make me happy most days.
Better and easier perhaps to list the things that make me unhappy and yet that list is also infinite but in a much less significant way.
The impact of happiness is sustaining and expansive. We must all dwell in a state of unhappiness from time to time but I find it is best given a good thinking on. Pondering perhaps, but then finding ways of diminishing the impact of sadness on daily life. Dwelling on happiness is a good thing. I find the inside of broad bean outer cases as an instant happy fix. Not perhaps something that marks me out as a wise old sage or internet wellness coach but it works for me every time. Similarly the inside of Horse Chestnut, conker,cases.
Imagine being so loved and nurtured that a disposable soft cocoon of natural fibres is created just to encourage you to thrive. If I was feeling particularly decadent as a small broadbean I would ask to grow near a bed of tomatoes so that my fluffy thriving was enhanced by the fragrance of crushed tomato leaves. So many things to make me happy. Why ever would I stop at thirty?
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