Croise devant, port de bras, demi-plie…
These expressions came creeping out of dark corners of my brain this week as I went to my first ballet class since I was a child.
Ballet class – me – at the age of 65!
Why for heavens’ sake? I’m a writer, not some frustrated prima ballerina. Not even almost retired Galena at the back of the corps de ballet!
Okay! It’s not a new idea. In fact it’s been done everywhere. But I find I like reading what people would take to an island to sustain them…
I like listening to Desert Island Discs too – wondering whether, if the island is truly a desert island, they dance to the music, conduct a symphony orchestra, play air guitar truly fortissimo – and all without being embarrassed! And I wonder if the music would be a solace, soothing ebbing spirits as passing days get notched into the trunk of the obligatory palm tree.
But back to the books…
No writing this afternoon, no swimming either … instead, bringing the ewes off the oat stubble on a stormy afternoon…
Through dust and dirt…
It’s a rainy day today.
My garden needs this, especially the herbs and veg which were considering turning their rooty toes up. Today, they are spritely and beaming at me as I look out the window.
More than any other year, this summer has given me a plethora of veggies in the garden and so I invested in the River Cottage Veg Book. And have we been eating flavoursome food?!
Pickling walnuts. Imagine a slab of sourdough, some fruit chutney (maybe apple and almond or fig and onion) some delicious aged cheddar that bites one’s tongue and pickled walnuts on the top. A thing of joy!
My love of boats began as a child and my attitude toward boats is rather like Ratty’s: that ‘there is nothing – absolutely nothing – half so much worth doing as simply messing about in boats…’
But perhaps I should qualify that.
Whilst I love being on rivers and round the coast, the idea of tackling something like the Sydney to Hobart Yacht Race in the vicious Tasman Sea and Bass Strait is a step too far. Mind you, in my youthful late-teens/early twenties, myself and other friends all thought seriously about putting our names down to be the ‘Return’ crews, sailing the racing boats slowly back to Sydney. Ha!
Gosh! What a year it has been!
And how fast it has flown!
I wonder sometimes if it’s an age thing, that time flies because one is on the downhill run…
I’m a very slow reader of fiction.
Partly because I spend a great deal of time reading non-fiction for research. For time off, I either embroider or tumble into bed exhausted at night and manage just 3-4 pages of the fiction novel I might be reading.
I haven’t counted the books I’ve read this year and will just list those in my library which appealed the most to me as a reader and writer. I’m not a believer in listing books which have not been what I had hoped or which I was unable to finish. I think it’s unfair to the author who may well by liked by many other readers and who has a brand and who has worked hard to pull off a good novel. Reading ‘likes’ are completely subjective and so below is my very subjective list…
Sometimes life is for escaping from.
Sometimes it’s for escaping to.
Today was the latter…
Very early this morning, the men decided to go fishing and being totally uninterested in the hunter-gatherer thing, I asked if they could drop me at Maria Island.
Thoughts for the new book are coming together.
I feel like a detective placing clues on a board. Some shout louder than others but somewhere in what I am looking at, a storyline is emerging. The legend of the Fox Spirit is whispering particularly loudly. Readers might remember her appearance in The Shifu Cloth. …
