Prevailing Winds

I recently read this poem by Margaret Atwood in her book, Eating fire,
Selected poetry 1965 - 1995. I go with it 100% , and four years ago made a painting with the same sentiments.

Dreams of the animals

Mostly the animals dream
of other animals each
according to its kind

(though certain mice and small rodents
have nightmares of a huge pink
shape with five claws descending)

: moles dream of darkness and delicate
mole smells

frogs dream of green and golden
frogs
sparkling like wet suns
among the lilies

red and black
striped fish, their eyes open have red and black striped
dreams defence, attack, meaningful
patterns

birds dream of territories
enclosed by singing,

Sometimes the animals dream of evil
in the form of soap and metal
but mostly the animals dream
of other animals.

There are exceptions:

the silver fox in the roadside zoo
dreams of digging out
and of baby foxes, their necks bitten

the caged armadillo
near the train
station, which runs
all day in figure eights
its piglet feet pattering,
no longer dreams
but is insane when waking:

the iguana
in the petshop window on St Catherine Street
crested, royal-eyed, ruling
its kingdom of water-dish and sawdust

dreams of sawdust.

I haven’t written here recently, I’m just so tied up with the paintings, but today it’s warm, spring, and I’m kind of relaxed, so-

I guess I’ve been fairly isolated in my work, it means sometimes I lack cross references and things to judge by or to boost me. We need things that encourages and keep us swimming along. It’s not necessary of course and lack of influence has it’s advantages, I guess.

I’m really keen on the painter Peter Doig, I don’t have a book about his work so I search on the net. His paintings have stories which I like, they don’t scream for attention. I find with paintings if the image puzzles, great, but if I can put my finger straight on the aim then something’s lacking. It seems to me art like nature is built on contradictions, the tinniest seed produces the mightiest tree, that sort of thing. The understated talks loudest. People who are good at whatever they do make you believe you can do it, can’t of course but it gives confidence and I find this with Peter Doig.

I paint and write, and these can be contradictions. The written word has a tendency to delete that which is not said, emphasising that what is. Are there stories between the lines? Generally with writing the mind sees the word and searches not far from it, it’s a truth, a fact. It can be debated, but what’s written is placed into history. With paintings the suggestion is louder than what’s seen, the images must go further than its surface or it’s not working, not a piece of art.

There are so many “good painters” producing images passed down, something that tells them, “this is art”. Guess we all do it but it’s really tedious.

I have written this in 21 minutes. They are meandering paragraphs, having fun with the blog, Joe as I call him. Today it’s just words on the wing, foghorns for Bedouins. It’s sunny, I shall go out into it and check this tomorrow.

Checked it, altered half a dozen words and now post it.
Two days later and have changed more words, maybe it’s not so good to write quickly.

For the last three weeks someone I haven’t seen for a very long time has been coming time and again into my thoughts. Pleasant and unassuming, these memories arrived at odd moments, while painting, relaxing or cutting the grass, whatever, until finally I tapped her name into Google research.

Extraordinary. I found her obituary in all the national papers in the UK. She had died on the 17th March at 95 years old, just a few days, as far as I can judge, before I had started to have these memories.

This has touched me. Her name was Margaret Mellis, she was an artist and I came to her through my grand parents, Tony and Sibby Mostyn who were friends with Margaret and her husband Francis Davison. Tony was also an artist, and it has to be said exceptional in his way, and they shared a time together at Walberswick, living and working in deluxe fisherman’s huts.

Later I knew her through my parents. We called on her one day at Southworld, (this is after the death of Francis), and then I saw her from time to time, especially during a period when I also rented one of the fisherman’s huts at Walberswick.

All these people have been in a time where faith showed more readily, and art connected in a more graceful manner. The nostalgia for such a period is obvious, but Margaret had a way of encouraging art, a rare quality, and I’m happy to have know such a women.

Here some of the links for her in the newspapers.

www.guardian.co.uk/artanddesign/2009/mar/21/obituary-margaret-mellis

www.telegraph.co.uk/news/obituaries/5033732/Margaret-Mellis.html

www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/obituaries/article5962215.ece

www.tate.org.uk/servlet/ArtistWorks?cgroupid=999999961&artistid=1620&page=1

www.margaretmellis.com/

You got a problem, eat this. No problems, ok eat. On a diet, eat this. Try this when friends come round and that when alone. When Napoleon was asked by a battle worn high ranking officer, who could just about carry the weight of his medals,
“And what about the people, what do we do with those who are left.”
He replied,
“Make sure their bellies are full and we’ll have full support.”
(Or something along those lines.) France has a long history of it culinary interest and it has to be said it still has. In fact, strangely there are those who believe it’s the only place on earth where one can eat well.

I have been to a see a film about the disappearing bees, and this is not just another scare. Where I live there are no more wild honey bees and if you wont to grow crops which are insect pollenated, it will be necessary to have or hire hives. The statistics are extraordinary. Last year 40% of the hives in Spain were lost, but it was 50%, 60%, 70% and 80% in various countries around the world. The insecticides have killed or weaken the bees, and the weaker ones are now being wiped out by a tick. When for example one is reminded that a crop of apples will probably have seventeen different herbicides and fungicides, and three insecticides, it doesn’t take a seer to see the results. Add to that the treatments on arable land and the insecticides with genetically modified crops, and it’s a done job. Bye bye bees.

A few years back bee keepers paid farmers to have their hives on their land, now it’s the farmers who pay and last year the price doubled. Around us some of the fields are treated with roundup before ploughing, a sight I find difficult to digest. Hectares upon hectares are sprayed and left for a couple of weeks to let all vegetation die off before ploughing. Just one of the side effects is there aren’t any rabbits. Road edges are constantly cut back, as is any wild growth in public places. Although fields are generally treated less now than twenty years ago, what’s used is more efficient and personal gardens have seen an increase in chemicals. The result of all this is devastating. Try imaging a world without enough bees.

Emmm, why one might ask is a country so infatuated with food not totally up in arms against the destruction of it’s environment.

Language. When I first arrive in France I said to a shopkeeper, “bonjour,” and he replied, “quoi.”

After a month intensive french at the local university, things improved. However, a limited vocabulary can be interesting as it leads to invention when filling gaps. I became quite good, in fact very inventive, as I figured out who’s who and what’s happening. I was living in a colourful world and perhaps it could be said I still am to a certain extent, but now its stretched eyebrows and lined foreheads that distract rather than unfilled spaces. It’s due to not loosing my accent of tea. Depending on who’s listening it seems to distort whatever I’m saying. Now thinking about it I realise I make people work to understand my wonderful words!

These flexible faces when trying to understand is a bit of a French characteristic, like also finding it amusing when words are mispronounced. Still, it’s not so good to make people work each time in order to understand, with language there’s many pitfalls but others language have deeper pits, it seems.

I have this book which really shows my limitations, it’s called , “Sky my husband, and is an alphabetical list of phrases, their literal translation and what it means in English. For instance:

Passer du coq à l’âne
Pass from cock to donkey

To change the subject.

Il m’a renvoyé l’ascenseur
He sent me back the elevator

He returned my favor.

Il avale des couleuvres
He swallows grass snakes.

He is taken in.

Il est con comme un balai
He’s stupid like a broom

He doesn’t know his arse from his elbow.

la barbe
The beard

What a bore.

En baver des ronds de chapeau
To slaver rounds of hat

To have your tongue hanging out.

Faire chou blanc
To make white cabbage

To fail completely.

And that’s just picking at random from a and b. So you see, c’est simple comme bonjour, it’s easy as pie.

My, how time flies. I haven’t written for Joe Blogs for -

Browsing through Schott’s miscellany is a sure way of loosing time. How about this:

Thrice the age of a dog is that of a horse.
Thrice the age of a horse is that of a man.
thrice the age of a man is that of a deer.
Thrice the age of a deer is that of an eagle.

If you are short on vocabulary: Floccinaucinihilipilification.

It means the estimation of a thing as worthless.

I’ve been wondering how to use cricket fielding positions when writing, Silly mid on and Silly mid off, have to be the Tweedledum and Tweedledee of an adventure story. Also cricket positions are big on legs. For instance our heroes in this epic could come across Leg Gully and the brothers, Square, Fine and Short Leg. Slip could be up to no good in the background with accomplices, Mid On and Mid Off. A plot of fast spinners with many scores to settle.

Schott’s miscellany makes me think I’m learning, - maybe I am, but it also has something in common with clichés and with clichés one doesn’t have to think. For example,

We brought nothing into this world and we wont be taking anything out.

That has to be a classic, but we bring love in and hopefully take it out, with wisdom.

Get this: (It’s cockney rhyming slang.)

Would you Adam and Eve it. The battle cruiser down the frog and toad now sells rosie lee. Soon you’ll have to have a whistle and flute with peckham rye to get in.

(Would you believe it, the pub down the road now sells tea. Soon you’ll have to have a suit and tie to get in.)

And with this wonderful book I can say,

Pax vobiscum. Deo volente.

I have written a novel entwined with an epic topic, the tropics of South America. Rain forests are disappearing fast and none faster than the Amazon.

My story is a story of love and how man’s inherent love is inseparable from our environment. The aim is protection of the Amazon jungle, but as I thought about this I saw it was the non physical as well as the tangible that held the planet together.

A few facts about the Amazon rain forest which are in the novel.

1.5 acres of rain forest are lost every second.
137 plants and animals are being made extinct every day due to deforestation.
More than half of the worlds estimated 10 million species of plants, animals and insects, live in the tropical rain forest.
At least 3000 fruits are found in the rain forest.
Rain forests are millions of years old.
A single pond in the amazon basin can sustain a greater variety of fish than is found in all of Europe’s rivers.
One acre of rain forest may contain 700 species of trees.
More than twenty percent of the earth’s oxygen is produced by the Amazon forest.
One sixth of all the fresh water found on the planet is in the Amazon basin.

In forty years the jungle will be a desert.

I have been told by a lady in the village my aura needs beefing, so she is doing just that. I am having magnetism treatment.

Apparently ailments will diminish aura, and having had lower back pains for nine months, mine obviously had subsided. I have in the past improved things through yoga, and once temporarily cured the ache by fasciatherapie, which is very like magnetism, now I’m under the hands of this lady.

She’s not someone who so far has had an easy time of things, but has kept throughout her trials the ability to heal others, even on one occasion saving a cow from being shot due to a gammy foot. Now there’s recommendation?

She told me four sessions on consecutive days would be needed, sounded serious, but anyhow after the first two the aura is a brighter blue and emotions coloured in gay hues. The magnificent greys of the sky I shall keep in mind for a painting.

Each session was started with me standing, relaxed as possible, while she brushed down my aura. This was done with sweeping movements of her hands in a downwards direction, about half a metre from me. The strokes were aimed at a shell with salt in it, which she took away at the end.

After that I lied comfortably on my back, she placed her hands on my shoulders and with a slow gentle movement, similar to being pawed by a cat, took any tension out of the muscles. Strange but I felt I swayed a little. From there she moved to the head and covered my eyes with her palms. They stayed there for what seemed liked minutes, but more like seconds, before the ears got the same treatment. I felt the heat from her hands.

The head is worked upon by holding it, and finished with a massage to the neck. From there she moved down, concentrating on energy points. From time to time her hands slowly slid to another area, she told me it was to chase the energy and like this certain pains were pinpointed with true accuracy. Apparently the problem with the back is due to the gallbladder.

Working on the feet came last, and the session was finished with sweeping movements to the soles, without touching them. I really felt the pressure of her hand as it approached.

What I find a little strange is having started out convinced, I’m now a little sceptic, yet still sure if any cure is needed this is how it will happen. Sounds contradictory, probably a side result.

I was warned there might be consequences and sure enough after the first session I was really irritable. Unfortunately there has been a couple staying with us, the lady got under my skin and ho-hum, I showed it.

The guest is a hypochondriac, talks constantly about her health and spends huge amounts on remedies, so to try and save the day I gave her my third session. She got a pampered massage, forgave me and for now I shall have to live with back pains.

On my second session though I was given the name of my guardian angel. It’s Cahetel. There is a list of seventy two angels, and according to your date of birth you have been allocated. Cahetel, so my google research tells me, is amazing. I should be so lucky, but don’t get me wrong, I believe you are not alone.

Jenny left a comment, she has told us of her chapel of miracles. Chapel of miracles, such lovely sounds and a place the majority search.

I looked up miracle in the dictionary.

A surprising and welcome event that is not explicable by natural or scientific laws and is therefore considered to be the work of a divine agency.

A highly improbable or extraordinary event, development, or accomplishment that brings very welcome consequences.

And in the Collins dictionary:

An event contrary to the laws of nature.

I don’t know, this doesn’t seem enough to me. A miracle is so, so sort of unexplainable and in our understanding surely is an act of God. The work of a divine agency. Agency, that implies something to do with business, so I looked that up and sure enough,

“a business or organisation established to provide a particular service, typically one that involves organising transactions between two other parties.”

It did have, “ A thing or person that acts to produce a particular result.” So there you have it, there’s someone around who makes things happen.

I believe it. (I’m not looking up believe.) I’ve always felt for where the finger can’t be placed, it can give me goose pimples when thinking about it, but maybe it’s more a feeling than thought.

A woman in our village recently told me she had gone to the church to ask God for some money, she can’t pay the bills. She was so open and honest about it I think she should buy a lottery ticket, but we know thinking these sort of things wont make coins fall from heaven, don’t we? Miracles are indeed a strange phenomenon. We are what we believe yet we don’t need faith for a miracle. Where it’s believed in the most, it can happen the least, for example the trenches in the first world war.

I would like a miracle please, but you know if miracles are in limited supply I wont be getting one, I’m lucky enough to be way down the list, and hey, my pockets have had holes in them for years.

I like the sea. From the shore I look out and feel good. I used to sketch masses when on the coast but lately I scribble with words. At the weekend our little daughter insisted we go again, children never seem to tire of the beach. My thoughts were around images for paintings, words to fix with paint and for what it’s worth here are a few lines from the sketch book.

Sea, a place for you and me.

Thoughts left behind in sand.
Words washed smooth by sea.

Reflections of light like love sparkle on the crest.

It’s good to be naked like C.

A little boy watches older little boys climbing rocks, he sees the future.

Islands in vastness of sea.
Islands in vastness of me.

Alone with incoming tide and outgoing currents.

I ask myself why do I want to put them in a public place, as like quick drawings, quick words are there to assist on other things and I’m very likely going to use something from them. Maybe I will take them off the blog later.

It intrigues me how easily words slip into melancholy when taking a sideways look, or perhaps that’s me. But hey, I’m a jovial character, it’s just that pensive thoughts have a sense of seriousness.

My favourite is, “Reflections of light like love sparkle on the crest.”

I shall use this and thank my daughter for insisting.