SoS in the garden: 5/9
Spring has honestly sprung.
Which is always exciting in any garden, bringing with it promises of beauty and excellence.
Spring has honestly sprung.
Which is always exciting in any garden, bringing with it promises of beauty and excellence.
Unless one has crawled under a stone this year and stayed there for the last 8 months, it would be almost impossible to be unaware of a total global shakeup.
In the beginning of 2020 in my own case, an epidemic (at the time) was something happening far away. I remember sitting on the beach and between swims with friends, we chatted about what we would do if Covid-19 arrived in our own little state of Tasmania (Australia). We decided we’d retreat to exactly the place we were at, for however long it took.
As the rest of the world faces ongoing battles with Covid 19, it’s easy to feel a degree of guilt that we are enjoying a certain amount of freedom and no reported cases in my little island state of Tasmania. That said, we also feel a profound sense of gratitude that we have clear air – in so many ways.
The state’s Cape Grim is reputed to have the cleanest air in the world…
And of course, we’re one of the southern bases servicing Antarctica, so we get a puff of clear air from the south very often! This week, after a week where we thought spring had arrived early, with blossoms and bulbs popping out everywhere, the snow is falling on Kunyani/Mt.Wellington and the Met forecasts snow down to 100 metres which just about puts it in the farmyard, certainly in the higher hills. Everyone’s very excited because we don’t get low-lying snow often and even tomorrow, they say the snowline will melt back swiftly to higher elevations.
So we wait impatiently for that brief blanket of white.
At some point, maybe in the first chapter even, a writer will wonder if he or she has a story.
For me, I write to roughly the half way mark or even just the first 50,000 words and then I send it to my trusted editor for an opinion.
These last couple of weeks, I have held back from continuing with the manuscript of Reliquary until I had a definitive answer on whether the story had legs.
I’ve been a bit busy lately getting a new book ‘out there’ and dealing with the oddness of publishing something so far outside my usual genre. A pillowbook, for heaven’s sake!
And in amongst that, taking time to push on with the next in a hist.fict series – this one entitled Reliquary. Such things serve to remove one somewhat from the garden and gardening. Then again, it’s been so damned cold that one could barely pick up secateurs, let alone open them.
This latest addition to my published list is a rather cryptic, enigmatic little non-fiction book called The Pillowbook of Prudence.
A million miles from what I usually write.
My latest reading list spreads right across the technological board and I’m enjoying the experience.
My dear friend Brian passed away yesterday.
I thought words would flow easily writing this, being a so-called wordsmith, but my fingers are stalling on the keyboard.
I follow American writer Tom Ryan on Facebook and on Instagram.
I count myself privileged to have read his books Following Atticus and Will’s Red Coat. Tom’s words are even larger and more infinite than his cherished relationships with his dogs.