The end of lifeonarug.

I LEAVE TAYMOUNT

This is a sudden goodbye to Taymount and life on a rug. Like many things in life, the decision to leave came suddenly and although I came up with lots of reasons, the why is still the same mystery it always is.

I like to put it down to watching the re-runs of Billy Connolly's tour of Australia, four episodes back to back. I thought it all looked pretty good and more to the point pretty WARM. With the wonders of internet and telephone I was able to book and pay for a ticket first thing the next day. I leave in a week.

The agent is looking for a tenant now I have proved it is possible to live in the small space. Right now I am spending the last week in London housesitting for old friends while they are in Canada. I have yet to clear my things from the flat, but this will happen next week.

I will be back in London in mid May, hopefully heading for the South of France to enjoy some good weather down there for a while.

Meanwhile it is back to Melbourne, and back to facing up to the huge amount of 'stuff' that is still waiting for me. The cupboards and bags and bags of packed Poole china has to be found a future, alongside the huge collection of hand thrown Australian potter, plus the remnants of the rugs I imported (lots), plus the family history material that I dropped into a very large stripey bag, plus the archives from my thesis that are such an embarrassing mess I need to sort it out before donating it to the National Library of Australia. Have I menetioned all the art that has to be framed and hung? I nearly forgot those 8 thousand second hand books. I am just going to take it small step by small step!!

The terrible threats made for a very bad bushfire season did not eventuate thank goodness. It was part of the reason for putting so much distance between myself and my home. The experience we all lived through in early 2009 was hard, and somewhat confusing when you saw the awfulness of the fire, and the death of people we all knew, and the loss of homes and properties. It was confusing because we felt we should feel grateful we survived with everything intact, but in fact felt traumatised just the same.

It has been fun living in my tiny studio flat. It has been good for me to be still and quiet and not doing too much. I hope I am calmer, and more able to deal with the future and what ever it brings.

To everyone out there......let's all live each day with something to celebrate.

I DRAW

I DRAW

A note of explanation is required about my technical ineptitude loading pictures onto my blog. I think that I am placing them within the text, but every time they decide they are going to appear at the start. Sorry people, just imagine they are in the appropriate place.........

It rained yesterday and the snow and ice are fast melting. What a relief. I loved the LOOK of the snow. I am really glad I was here for this time. I am very glad never the less, I can walk around again, without fear of falling.

So what next friends?
My BBC French course (online) has progressed not at all since I completed the first half of the first lesson.
My aim to grasp Positive Psychology and apply it to my life has somehow not quite happened either.

I have been following Clive's blog (Art and the Aethete), where he talks so interestingly about printmakers of a certain era. He has rekindled my love of prints and reminded me that once upon a time, I made prints as well. I may start drawing again. I am going to post a drawing I did in my notebook a moment ago, just to prove to myself that I am game to get started. Here goes with drawing one!! THIS IS WHERE THE SECOND PICTURE SHOULD APPEAR!



Being a devotee to Charity Shops (Oz people read Opp Shop). Several weeks ago I found a wonderful deep blue and white kimono style, THIS IS WHERE THE FIRST PICTURE SHOULD APPEAR....

It has inspired me to do the quick drawing....I love the boldness of the blue,and the contrast the white has against it. I don't know if the characters really are Japanese/Chinese characters, of if they are just a Europeon picking up an aspect of the design. I once had a 'happy coat' very similar to this one, and someone pointed out to me the characters where the name of a famous Japanese airline.

Housebound at Taymount

Housebound still.




As I look out of my window, it is snowing again. It is a bit hard to see but there is snow whirling around!! I am happy to admit I am a wimp. I still haven't made it down the hill to the shops. I did try twice today, but the slippery icy sludge on the roadway and the icy patches on the foot path scared me back to the flat.

What am I doing day after day? Today I decided to get a little bit of exercise by walking/running up the stairs inside the building. Of course the view from the top floor was so amazing that I forgot about the going down again for some time. I can see toward London Dockland and it is snow everywhere. I did the up and down the stairs a few times and felt virtuous. I decided to copy out a recipe for Irish Soda Bread while my internet connection was working. My internet is dependant on mobile phone reception, and it varies up here from low to very low or not at all. Soda Bread will come in handy if i don't get to the shops before I run out of bread (very soon). I have made bread and butter pudding out of stale bread...yum yum. I am showing you the pud before I ate half of it a short while ago.

This is an opportunity to read some of the few books on my shelf. If you haven't come across William DALRYMPLE, then don't leave it too long. What an interesting travel writer he is. It is not only that he effortlessly passes on such fascinating information, he does it with such style. The book I have just read is City of Djinns; a year in Delhi. His previous book I read and also enjoyed greatly was In Xanadu.

In City of Djinns, he unravels the history of Delhi from the more recent Partitian, where we hear it from those who were directly affected. Then he delves back far into ancient times. It isn't just the history he is looking at, but the day to day life he is leading - telling us of the heat, the dust, the stomach upsets and the foibles of his landlady and her extended family.

Last night I finished Georgina Howell's Daughter of the Desert: the remarkable life of Gertrude Bell. What a story Howell tells. What a woman Gertrude Bell was. I had heard bits and pieces of her story before, mainly to do with archeology. I had no idea she was the first woman mountain climber. I knew a little of her adventures in the desert and her friendship with Lawrence of Arabia but no idea of her political involvement in the setting up of Iraq. It adds such pathos to the story of what has happened to Iraq in recent decades. I didn't know that the Museum that was looted when the Americans invaded, was set up by her. Did you know this? I learn so much about what is now Iraq, and so much about Gertrude Bell, and along the way I began to understand something of the complexities of the people who live in that region. My heart ached for her when the love of her life died on the Western Front. She never really got over it. A woman writing about a woman does see significance in different things than a man might. For example, we learn how Gertrude managed about clothing - first as a mountain climber at a time when women couldn't be seen in trousers, and at a later date when she dressed the part of a Queen in the desert to gain entree to the world of the Sheiks. Interesting stuff this.

Unlike William Dalrymple, Georgina Howell does not have a gift of language or a developed ability to talk about complex situations with clarity. I kept getting confused as she jumped from 1914 talking about the Great War, backwards and then forwards. Never mind, all is forgiven as the subject overcame all obstacles to leap out the pages of the book and into the very room I was reading in - that is the 'life on a rug' room as I have no other!

I have also read a much lighter book based on the recollections of a retired lecturer, of his first headship in a small village school in North Yorkshire in 1978. Jack Sheffied is on a winner here, as these stories are full of nostalgic charm and the usual cast of village characters. It was a gentle chuckle all the way. My last book, the one I have just started is Judith Levine Not Buying it: my year without shopping. This is part of the Living Simply movement. I have to say I love the IDEA of her book, but find it a bit pretentious. Do I really want to read about Plato at the same time as hearing about what she plans to not buy for the next year? I will keep reading because I want to learn how to live on less so I can not have to go to work part time. Right now because of being too scared to venture down the icy hill I am not spending at all, so I am getting into practice for Living Simply.

Will this weather ever improve? What am I doing here when I could be floating in my swimming Pool in the Bend of Islands in 35 degree heat? Am I mad? Do I really need to come this far to find my purpose in life? I could always go up the local mountains to the snow in winter if I really wanted to expereince snow. At least there they would know about snow chains for cars, snow ploughs for the roads and would be prepared for the weather.

Snow, snow and snow!

SNOW SNOW SNOW




This is the UK. This is London. The whole place has gone quite perculiar about the weather. The TV news hardly bothers with the rest of the world, politics, murder, scandal. No, it's all about snow. Snow Snow Snow!!!

You can see the view out of my window here at Taymount Grange - that was this morning. I did go out for 5 minutes. I'd like to go walking as everything looked beautiful in bright white light reflected from the snow. I wanted to go looking at the world that has turned white and magical. I didn't go anywhere. The road hasn't been gritted/salted, nor the footpaths. It was far too dangerous for me. A returning resident told me it was icy and slippery down on the pavements in the main Forest Hill area.

You would think I would be going stir crazy having barely been out of my room for several days since the snow started again. I'm not. I'm enjoying this forced rest. I sit at the window and i can see the sky and the bare trees and the snow everywhere. i can see the squirrels jumping from limb to limb and tree to tree. They dislodge bits of snow and the snow falls gently to the ground. I also see the brave and the foolish going out to work, school or just to prove they are hardy and can manage this extreme weather. I have a friend, and she really reflects that 'grit' the English had in the 2nd World War. She is getting to work every day regardless. She makes no fuss. She just goes.

I had promised myself as a New Year resolution to do the BBC French lessons on line. I have done one, and I have no excuse what so ever for not doing two today as I planned. I also promised myself to read the new book i ordered on Positive Psychology. I haven't done that either. What I have done is watch TV. I watch all the property shows (including the repeats I have already seen). i watch the new series of 'Wanted Down Under' ( flying families to Oz and NZ for one week to look at houses, jobs, lifestyle). It is a wonder they don't all collapse with jetlag day one. It looks like a pretty good place to me!!! Sea, sunshine and friendly people.

All the planned gallery and museum visits, all the concerts and visiting I was going to do is all out the window thanks to the snow.

Enough about snow.

I visit Christina of Denmark

http://www.nationalgallery.org.uk/paintings/hans-holbein-the-younger-christina-of-denmark-duchess-of-milan

Please follow this link to see my favourite painting. I know there is a way for me to do this with my photo program but I don't seem to remember how.

I did catch up with Christina of Denmark, Duchess of Milan, just a few days ago. When I look at this work of Holbein's I want to hold my breath for a very long time.

The English are kindness itself, letting all of us see the collection without charge, presented beautifully and in such good condition. I salute this country for what is offers every visitor, so quietly and without fanfare. Of course, there is a problem when you offer all of this for free on a grey, drizzling winter Sunday between Christmas and New Year. Lots and lots of visitors! Not all of them are here because they love a painting the way I do this one. No indeed they are here because it is on the 'list' of things to do. Let's not forget it is free, perhaps the biggest atttraction of all. As usual the gift shop is packed even tighter than the picture galleries.

I am interested to see on the website (as you will if you follow the link), that this painting is the focus of some project of people writing about the subject. This is what I will write .......

This is so beautifully painted. The artistic skills, the use of the paint, the placement of the figure in the picture frame. The slight tilt of her head that changes the way we perceive the subject. Holbein has managed to depict the black gown so that is not only sombre but also rich. I want to walk into the room and finger that fabric. This subject is so much a real person that I feel I just might know her in another life.

I love the painting, but I feel angry at the reason for its existence. This young woman, perhaps 15 or so years of age, is being traded on again. Look at the story - married at 11 years of age by proxy, a widow at 13. What to do with here? Was she a virgin widow and would that add to her value? Within another few years she is again married, this time to the future Duc of Lorraine. Four years of married life is all she has before she is widowed again. For the rest of her life, until 1590, she lives as the Regent of Lorraine.

I like to think that Holbein used his extraordinary talents as a portrait painter to carefully show Christina in such a light as to not appeal to his patron Henry VIII. I think I am being fanciful here. He was a great portrait painter, and in this work he is able to show us that she is no simpering pretty girl, but a sad woman of strength, who feels powerless in the world she finds herself in.

Christmas meets Colin the Caterpillar

Colin the Caterpillar

These photos show you Colin the Caterpillar - described as "extremely chocolatey...chocolate sponge roll filled with chocolate buttercream, covered in milk chocolate with a decorated white chocolate face and sugar coated chocolate beans:. Colin contains no artifical colours or flavourings.

Colin has joined me for Christmas Eve in my lonely little room. I found Colin in the Marks and Spencer shop on Charing Cross railway station, reduced to 3 pounds, on my way back from.....well there is where the story lies really.

I decided that I was a boring old f**t. Here it was Christmas Eve day and what was I doing? Wandering around the Sainsbury's supermarket in Forest Hill, just down the hill from the flat. On the spur of the moment I jumped a train and decided to visit my favourite Holbein portrait in the National Gallery. I have chosen one of the few times when the National Gallery is not open. It must have shut at lunch time. But, goodness me, where am I? In Trafalgar Square. What else is there? St Martins in the Field church of course!

A family Christmas service was about to start in this beautful and very recently refurbished building. The gold leaf shimmered. There were mothers and fathers and grandmothers and grandfathers with lots of small children. How warm and fuzzy it felt. This was a quite different London to the one I had just left south of the river. This congregation was no multicultural London. This was white and middle class. 99% white, with two non-white people, who it turned out where not regular attendees - one was a carer for a very elderly infirm lady (and left before the service began) and the other was a tall and handsome man playing the part of one of the 3 wise men. Who was wise here??

Let me shudder now.

This service was more like attending one of that strange breed of English stage productions called the Pantomime. Yes we were coached in calling out " Ba Ba Ba" (we were being sheep at the manger), and "No No Follow the star".

I kid you not.

The actors were the Rev Richard Carter and the Rev Rosy Fairhus. Their talents extended to playing Mary and Joseph complete with costumes. Joseph's line for a laugh was "Jesus Christ" when Mary tell him she is pregnant and he asks who the father is..... and she answers "Whgy yes, how did you know his name"..this was truly truly truly bad stuff. How could they do it?? To give you an idea of the rest of it, here are the lines for one of them playing a 3 wise men part......

" I'm hot and sore what a fool
I should have stayed by the swimming pool
Watching X Factor ont he box
Instead of all this sand in my socks
I don't need to follow this star
I'm already following Borck Obama"
[we then come in with "No No Follow the Star".

We were taught a Christmas carol/song before the service began...all bouncy and loud and meaningless. Thanks be to God we were allowed to sing some of the all time favourite childrens carols. Tears began to run down my face when we sang 'Away in a manger'. It was if I was a child again, remembering the wonder and the specialness of Christmas when it was much simpler. I had thought the whole service might be a bit like this.

How could they have done this in that beautiful beautiful church, where the choir (or a very small part of it) sent a few soaring notes to the heavens, but otherwise had to belt out the bouncy stuff.

I am glad I went. It was my one Christmas thing....one reminder of what all this was supposed to be about.

So Happy Christms all

Christmas eve day at Taymount

The snow is just about gone. Washed away in the night.

Ah! This is more the London winter I remember. No white snow. No blue skies. No sunshine for sure. Here is is grey, overcast and dull. It rained all night and the fine drizzle is still coming down.

The snow was an inconvenience in the end. It looked so pretty out the window but it made it near impossible to get around easily. The English behaved as if snow had never come down in this city before. They had special news programs telling me nothing of any use at all. The Eurostar was stuck in the tunnel all one night and suspended services for three days in the run up to Xmas. You can imagine how that went down.

I wanted to go walking and looking at how beautiful things looked. Although in the end they gritted the roads, the footpaths became largely impassable as they were like ice rinks. The buses would pull to a halt and out you would step, not sure if you slide or not. In the end I did what they told me to do, and really didn't go out much. I am a abit stir crazy and will go for a long walk today, rain or no rain.

All this excitement about snow has meant that everyone has had their Xmas preparations upset. Flying was uncertain, people told not to go in their cars unless necessary.So many people return to families at this time of year, and London is a city of people who come from somewhere else. Today they are all loading their cars and driving off, setting off on all the trips home that have been delayed by the snow and conditions on the road. I am relieved, and will now have no problems getting around for Xmas day to my aunt and family.

Last night I turned the hot plate on under the egg I was about to boil and then realised 5 minutes later it was not working. My cooker has packed up it seems! I unpacked the microwave that has been waiting to be installed. This might push forward the work on the shower and the re-design of the kitchette I think.

It seems a little strange doing so little preparation for Xmas, but very relaxing. I have to leave cooking the bread and butter pud until I get to my aunt's place tomorrow. I have little token presents wrapped and ready. I am responsible for the deserts, so it is the bread and butter pud, rapberry cheese cake, merangue cases with blackberries and cream. I am helping with the veg, that will include sweet potatoes, pumpkin, potatoes, onions etc, hopefullyd one with lots of olive oil and balsamic vinegar, garlic and parsley.

I have 'chatted'with my son on Skype. He didn't have headphones or microphone so it was a funny chat. Anyhow I hope my son and the grandsons enjoy Christmas in the bush, with a swim in the pool. They will have Xmas lunch with my sister and family in the city. This will be an outside BBQ and roast veg. Quite informal and simple. If I had been in Oz, it would have been Xmas lunch in the bush at my place.