BexThorts

It came in the post today!

2012-02-02T16:01:00.000Z

Just when you figure life is full of lemons, (even if they are travelling lemons), something like this happens. This morning I was half way through today's writing - just over 3.300 words and still counting - when this turned up on the post:

'Go Away I'm writing' bag by What The Dickens

How good is that, guys? Many thanks to my splendiferous friend Sara for thinking of me. xxx

Oh, and a note to Claudina: I tried to take a photo of the spangley sequin mini skirt so I could show you, because as you say, it is very jolly, but the sequins are black, and it didn't come out. So you'll just have to imagine me in a black, spangley, and very jolly sequin mini skirt. Sorry.

Clear Blue View

2012-02-01T15:47:00.000Z

I'm going to talk about something people don't usually mention.

I'm 44 years old and I'm three weeks late.

Yep, not good.

So last night, my husband and I had 'The Talk'. The one where we hunker down and go through the ramifications of what we are going to do IF. Even though we both know there is no IF, because rationally, for reasons I shall not go into for fear of making you, and him, blush, it just ain't possible. But the fact remains that I am late. And three weeks for me is a seriously big deal. You are talking to the woman who, throughout her twenties, could time her periods by her watch. Every fourth Thursday, 10am. Clockwork. Even when I was anorexic. Never missed a bloody one, even when I was six and a half stone. Never had a scare that was any longer than four days. Never.

And then we went down to the 24 hour supermarket and bought a pregnancy test.

(Which would have been fine if we hadn't bumped into an old acquaintence at the checkout, and believe you me, when you are 44 and 3 weeks late, you don't want to be caught with a Clearview pack at 8pm in Tesco by someone you haven't seen in 10 years, and who has a basket full of Johnsons baby wipes because they've just had their THIRD!)

And then did the three minutes of sweating and waiting for the test to prove NEGATIVE, just as we knew it would.

And then we were both sad.

Not that we in any way regret the choice of being childfree that life has dealt us. I know that being a mother is just not right for me, not simply because of my health, but because of my temperament. I don't have the patience or the interest, and I am terrified of schools. But still. It might have been my last chance. And thats a very miserable thought.

So now I am 44 years old and 3 weeks late and definitely NOT pregnant (but mourning very slightly). Which can only mean one thing:

MENOPAUSE

And believe me, I am just not, in any way, shape or form, ready for that. I dye my hair, for Gods' sake. I am in total denial of my wrinkles and age spots, and the fact that I can remember the Winter of Discontent and the drought of 1976. I just bought a sequinned mini skirt! This can't be happening! Pregnancy would have been a picnic by comparison! (And before you go wondering about my health and all the other things that could make me miss, let me put your mind at rest. I'm pretty sure that it can't be something nasty in that particular woodshed because menopause comes pretty early amongst the women in my family. But I will get it checked, just to put your mind at ease.) So here I am, curled up on the sofa, waiting for Mr Flow to come to town, and having a mid-life crisis.

Grief

2012-01-18T10:04:00.000Z

Sherlock Holmes died last Sunday night. Yes, I know it was all a fix and he'll be coming back, but his poor Watson doesn't know that, does he?

The most poignant moment of the programme for me was right at the end. John stood over Sherlock's grave and begged him for one last miracle.

'Stop being dead. Just stop - this.'

Thats what we all want, when someone dies.

I can remember last summer, standing outside the church after my step-father's memorial service, talking to the lay preacher, a family friend who had helped lead the ceremony. 'I just want him back,' I sobbed.

For many years I have been having dreams about my father, who died when I was 13. In my dreams, which are not the same every time, but share the same theme, my father comes back to our family home. He is sullen and unhappy, won't say where he has been, or whether he is staying. There is always the suggestion that he has been with another woman, another family, elsewhere. And there is that fear that he will go away again. But I am just so happy to have him back that I try not to care - I just want him back. Next month it will be 30 years since he died, and I am still having these dreams.

My point is that when somebody dies, all we want is to have them back. But if they came back, it wouldn't be the way we want it to be, all hearts and flowers. Life isn't like that. There are no Jesuses, or Holmeses, to return from the dead. We are just left to get on with living without those we love as best we can.

The 'word' for 2012

2012-01-10T20:47:00.000Z

All over the internet in the last 10 days, people have been talking about what their 'word' for 2012 is. Courage? Passion? Experiment? Embrace? Everybody seems to have come up with a word that embodies their theme for the year, something they can keep coming back to, that guides the way they approach their life in the coming months and helps them to achieve their goals.

Last year, mine was 'self care'. 2011 was my 'year of self care', and the fact that I made it through 2011, with all its traumas, in one piece, says a lot for how self caring I have learnt to be.

But I have been wrestling with what I wanted for 2012. Couldn't get my head around it. (Probably not helped by this going round and round in my head! You can imagine how distracting that would be. But I digress...)

Then, this afternoon my counsellor/guru told me a question her old training course leader used to ask:

What would you do if you really loved yourself?

None of the usual pfaffing about.

What do you need right now? A danish? Oh, yes, a great big danish pastry would be a really good idea, Rebecca, considering your IBS and wheat intolerance. Yep, that sound really self-caring, that does.

Just think about that question for a minute.

Genius, isn't it?

So I'm not going to have a word this year, but a question. A question I shall ask myself every morning when I get up. And I hope that it will change the way I live, and make my dreams come true. Or at least mean I take better care of myself and feel well a little more often.

The evil that is the 'To Do List'

2012-01-05T17:05:00.000Z

Every day since we got home from our annual Christmas visiting marathon, I've been assembling a To Do List so that I can plough through a) all the things that I should have got done before we went away, b) all the things that need doing because we've been away, and c) all the things I want to do because its New Year and I have all these daft ideas about things I want to change, as everyone does around now. Which is all well and good, but what I have of course not taken account of is that my body has just spent two weeks travelling, not sleeping, eating inappropriate food, being in constant motion, and processing continual language (old people talk A LOT).

Today, it all packed up.

Its been really hard for me to accept that I just wasn't going to get anything done today. To say 'stuff the To Do List!'

But the baubles are going to have to wait another day to be packed back into the box, and the bedding will have to wait another day to be washed. I gave myself a face pack and went back to bed. When I woke up, the sky was livid with the stripes of a winter sunset and the bedroom full of velvet shadows. And I thought:

Enough.

Enough with the To Do list thing. Give yourself a break, Rebecca. Life is too short and too beautiful to be raging about whether you finished all the things on your list today. You just have to live every day as it comes.

I'm reviewing the situation....

2011-12-20T18:24:00.000Z

Ron Moody as Fagin in the film 'Oliver!'

Its that Dickensian time of year again, the last few days before the Big Day. I finished my shopping today, and the presents are wrapped and under the tree. And now I am taking a bit of time to sit on the sofa and think about the last six months, and the next. Its been a very complicated time. I've:

written about 50,000 words at least
helped to organise my stepfather's funeral
helped to care for my grieving mother
grieved myself, too
been to my niece's wedding
fallen in love with Him
And fallen back in love with Him
and met him. (He's wonderful.)
and changed my opinion of this. (Its a beautifully written book, in case you wondered.)
unblocked the drains (AGAIN)
fallen on the ice (AGAIN)
drifted in a dreamworld for most of the time.

I've also failed to:

meditate
do daily yoga
write many blog posts
finish my Victorian Bodice-ripper novel
look after myself in much of a tangible way
understand why I need to write 50,000 words of Sherlock fanfiction (It's about my father, apparently.)

But can this 'felon be a felon all her life?' (As the song goes.) My plan for the next few months in beginning to form, thanks partly due to the help in this book , which is amazing. So at this point, as I see it, 2012 is going to be the year of:

meditation
yoga
reading more great fiction and even a bit of poetry
finishing that Victorian Bodice-ripper
okay, look, I can't see me not still being addicted to this, can you?
writing writing writing
and maybe taking a life drawing class. But don't quote me on that.
And going to this. For def.
And writing more posts for this blog. And another one that I am secretly incubating, with the possible involvement of lemons. Watch this space....

And now I have to go and have a lie down and try not to think about Benny in that sheet.... I may be some time.

Writers Retreat

2011-11-14T20:03:00.000Z

The annual feet photo

Just come back from our annual writers retreat. What to say? Ate too much, laughed too much, didn't get enough sleep (elephants on roller skates in the room upstairs). And also got a bit of writing done. The standard of work read out on Saturday night by everyone was dazzling. All my love to Bridget, Nina, Clare, Sally, Heidi, and Pat.

Count the chins!

Happy New Year

2011-10-31T16:03:00.002Z

Today is Samhain, commonly known as Halloween, the Pagan new year. Today, Pagans all around the world are celebrating the last of the harvests, the harvest of Souls, and preparing for the Long Dark, the time of winter, where we venture into our interiors and seek out our personal bogeymen to exorcise. We look around at what we have achieved over the active Spring and Summer months, harvest what we cherish, and take it with us. And we celebrate those who have Gone Ahead to the otherside.

I've spent the day in contemplation today, walking and meditating, deciding what I want to take with me into the Long Dark, considering what plans I could make for the next three months (I tend to work up to Christmas at this point, because its such a huge, stressful event that I can't see past it). And I have been thinking about what I have achieved this year, and what I have lost.

Of course, tonight is especially poignant, as I will be mourning the passing of my step-father, and celebrating the gifts he gave me. His wisdom, his quiet strength, his wicked sense of humour, all of which I miss terribly. But I feel like I have sat shiva for him long enough. The grief will go on, but its time for me to end the mourning. He wouldn't want excessive wallowing. Its time to open myself up to the future now.

So I feel optimistic. I don't know what my plans will be for the coming months yet - they normally come to me in the days following the Festival - but I feel that I am coming back to myself now, and that I am over the worst. Lets hope the Long Dark isn't as bad as it sounds this year...

Fifteen Years Ago Today...

2011-10-19T12:15:00.000+01:00

A page from the Wedding Album on our 15th Wedding anniversary.

The Verb

2011-10-12T11:32:00.004+01:00

IanMcMillan, photo from Norwich Arts Centre website.

Last night I went to see Ian McMillan doing a recording of The Verb at Norwich Arts Centre with my pal Heidi Williamson, that talented poet. I'm not much one for poetry, I have to admit. I find a lot of it hugely pretentious. Studying Wordsworth for my degree probably didn't help. But I love Ian McMillan because of his voice and his dry humour - his work is full of wit, he makes the ordinary beautiful without sounding poncy and I adore that, which is why I wanted to go. (He also has the most incredible voice and Barnsley accent - I could listen to him read the Phone Book for the rest of my life and be happy!)

At the beginning of the evening, I sat there listening to a discussion about performance poetry, thinking 'why the f**k am I here, this is awful'. I could hardly follow what was being said, it seemed so ridiculous to me. And then the guests started reading their work.

Mind-blowing moment.

I had forgotten language could be so amazing, such a dazzling tapestry of image. 'Grapefruits and trombones'. Breathtaking.

So I'm not going to slag off poets anymore. I'm going to learn from them. Look at the way I use language in my work. Listen to words, fit them together in as many unexpected combinations as I can, expand my vocabulary. And maybe I'll got to a few more poetry readings. I know, its daring, but it might just work....

If you want to listen to the edition of The Verb which we witnessed, and hear me whooping in the background, its on BBC Radio 3 on Friday night, 14th October 2011, at 10pm. You could probably also get it on BBC iPlayer.

Fingers

2011-09-27T20:27:00.000+01:00

Its the little things that count. This morning he was puzzling over something, working out where a lecture would come in the semester, frowning over which week. Counting on his fingers. Apparently, even when you have a Ph.D, digital counting still means counting on your fingers!

So he holds out his left hand - because he is left handed (I've never been out with a right-handed man, isn't that interesting?). Then he holds it with his right hand, pressing his right thumb into the palm. He unfurls a finger for each count, and as he does, he bobs his hand up and down, only about a centimetre, a little dip, and then brings it back to where it was. When he runs out of fingers, he turns to his right hand and frowns at it, keeping the fingers of his left hand splayed out. And unfurls a new finger on his right hand for each continued number. When he's done counting, he examines his fingers, and those little puckers above his nose get the slightest bit deeper while he is thinking.

Those slightly curved, tanned fingers with their blunt ends and shapely nails.

Then he curls his hands up, and starts jabbing at his laptop again with his index fingers.

It's when he does the little things like that, that I know how much I love him.

Frock

2011-09-24T17:27:00.000+01:00

I've been at it all day, and I am now utterly certain. Shopping for a dress is the definition of HELL! I've been everywhere, in Norwich and Beccles, and there is nothing, and I mean nothing, that either a) I can afford, b) is suitable, by which I mean doesn't make me look like a whore,and has sleeves of some kind, and c) doesn't make me look like a camel in a frock. Or my grandmother.

Why is this so hard? I mean, I've even lost a whole dress size in the last three months, for Gods' sakes! Oh, well. I suppose I've got till the 23rd of October. And there is always ebay. Or the Boden catalogue. Which no doubt everybody else will be dressing from. Does anybody know a good dressmaker in the Norwich area for the next time I am invited to a big event, because I'm not going through this a third year running...

Greater love hath no pal....

2011-09-22T19:59:00.000+01:00

Article from The Observer Magazine 4.9.11

You know you have found a true friend when they understand the terrible compulsions that drive your life. And then save you articles about The Man from their Sunday papers as a result. Thank you Michelle, you are a wonder. Now I have come over all unnecessary (again)!

Greater love hath no pal....

2011-09-22T19:53:00.001+01:00

Mabon

2011-09-21T10:04:00.000+01:00

Today is the Autumn Equinox, or Mabon, the second of the three harvest festivals in Pagan religion. It's a time to look back over the growing season and consider what you have learnt and harvested - and to give thanks for that abundance.

As you can imagine, its been a tough summer for me, but I feel like I have a great harvest to celebrate, despite that. I've been tested, and feel I have come through. I shall miss my step father enormously, not least for his wisdom and wit, but he left me some beautiful gifts with his passing. One I keep coming back to now, at a time when we are about to move into the period of busyness leading up to Christmas, is his favourite poem. I read it at his funeral, and I think it encapsulates his philosophy of life. Today, in celebration, I am going to try to enact these words practically. I hope you will join me.

Leisure by W H Davies

WHAT is this life if, full of care,
We have no time to stand and stare?—
No time to stand beneath the boughs,
And stare as long as sheep and cows:
No time to see, when woods we pass,
Where squirrels hide their nuts in grass:
No time to see, in broad daylight,
Streams full of stars, like skies at night:
No time to turn at Beauty's glance,
And watch her feet, how they can dance:
No time to wait till her mouth can
Enrich that smile her eyes began?
A poor life this if, full of care,
We have no time to stand and stare.

Words Words Words Words Words...

2011-08-24T20:04:00.000+01:00


Spiral of Life at Norwich's Catholic Cathedral.

Regular readers (if I have any left) will have noticed a distinct lack of activity on this blog of late.

SORRY!

Yes, I have left undone that which I ought to have done and there is no health in me, as the Book of Common Prayer would put it. Partly, its the grief addling my brain and making it do weird things.

Like yesterday, at the hospital. I went to see the Dermatologist about the crusty lumps on my face. (Fine, thank you, no problems.) So, I figured, just walk in there, have your cheeks prodded and looked at through that little hand-held microscope they have, and Bob is your mother's brother.

Nope, Bex is sitting in the waiting area having a panic attack because she had to go in through the In-Patients entrance, and walk past the ward windows!

There were hospital beds. Of course, duh! Except they were the same kind of bed that my step father was in when he died. You can see where this is going, can't you? So there I was, stuffing Rescue Remedy and trying to do meditational breathing because of a bloody bedstead.

And then there are the stories. Like some weird plague of locusts, they have descended on me. I am struck down with imaginational pestilence. I wrote 5286 words today! I've written five major pieces of fiction since I got back from Hampshire, all upwards of 40 pages long and counting. And every time I close my eyes, there's more. Scenes are falling out of the sky on my head like shrapnel. I can hardly keep up with the laundry, let alone have a life and a marriage, in between all this writing. I've written more in the last four weeks than I have in years. It is getting beyond a joke. It's obviously a kind of dissociative activity, so I am trying not to knock it, but just occasionally it would be nice to have my brain back, please?

And the dreams. Eugh! I wake up feeling like I've run a marathon in my sleep. Last night I was swimming the length of the River Waveney. The night before, I was watching Welsh farm hands being mauled by two tigers (don't ask, really.) I dream vividly, so its not like I am getting any rest.

And don't even ask me about Benedict Cumberbatch!!!

I knew grief could do some daft things to you, but seriously, this is verging on something clinical. The only symptom I have not enjoyed yet has been the itchy scalp. My hair has gone limp and dry, but so far, no itches. Watch this space, people. The world will no doubt get a lot stranger before this is over...

A New Beginning

2011-08-09T10:02:00.000+01:00

Dear Reader,

Well, three weeks spent in Hampshire, looking after my mother following the death of my beloved step-father, sorting out the funeral, keeping going. I've been home since the 27th July and my head is still a mess. Everything feels so jumbled. I can't seem to concentrate on anything, and yet I was so organised and able to concentrate while it was happening. Now I am all over the shop! I'm trying to just go with it, to accept that this is part of the grieving process, and this is just what I need, but you know what I am for productivity and getting things done! I get frustrated. I want to be back on track, back in the programme. I beat myself up for not being able to do things, like write this blog. Its hard to accept that life is just going to be a bit confusing and off piste for a while.

And then I think of my mother, and the fact that she is alone again for the first time in 25 years. Its grim, at 80, when you are so vulnerable anyway. And the fact that she has done this once already, after my father died. I feel for her far more than I feel for me.

So please send her your prayers, or good vibes, or whatever you have spare, and bear with me while I get my jumble in order...

Reflection Monday

2011-07-04T09:46:00.000+01:00

My mother and step-father at our wedding, 1996

Monday is always a day I try to spend at home. Its the day before my regular counselling appointment, and I like to use it to rest intensively, and to take my time to think about where I am, and where I am going. This week it is especially apt, since I have a tough few days ahead of me.

I have to go down to visit my very sick Wicked Step Father (he isn't really wicked, he's wonderful, but I've always called him that as a joke), and support my mother. I haven't been able to see them since October because I have been unable to travel, but via various 'cheats' this week, I will manage it finally. And its going to be tough.

But I am formulating a plan. And my plan is to stop every now and then and be mindful. Be present. Let the feelings come up, feel them, and let them go. Not worry about the next moment, just cope with what I've got in front of me right now. One thing at a time. Like eating the elephant, which is one of my favorite metaphors.

Birdie News

2011-07-01T13:46:00.000+01:00

Having nearly blown a gasket listening to this morning's edition of Radio 4's excellent comedy, Cabin Pressure (if you haven't heard it, where have you been? Games of 'Travelling Lemon' will be going on all over the country without you....), I thought I had better get down to updating you on the progress of our precious babies.

Here they are, photo taken Wednesday 29 June, and you can see the quills of their feathers developing.

And here they are today, gazing at me with the impressive malevolence of all chicks everywhere. How cute is that?

Birth Announcement

2011-06-27T21:09:00.000+01:00

Love those out-sized beaks!

Pat and Bex are delighted to announce the birth of four, long-awaited new Barrows - Pugh, Pugh, Barney and McGrew, hatched on Saturday and already growing apace. Mummy and Daddy are looking exhausted already. Keiran and George, our local mini-twitchers, reliably inform me that they are spotted flycatchers. Thank you, boys! And on the shelf in our back porch too!

Mid Life Crisis

2011-06-19T19:52:00.000+01:00

Foundations by YSL, Barbara Daly @ Tesco, Lily Lolo, Max Factor, Lavera and Dr Hauschka

I don't know whether it was watching the Terry Pratchett documentary on Assisted Dying, or the current precarious health of our respective parents, but this house has become Mid Life Crisis Central in the last week. Pat is talking about giving up his portfolio worker status and seeking out a regular paycheck. Okay, he does this periodically, but I'm not sure I have ever seen him so serious before. And me, I'm seriously considering the benefits of plastic surgery.

Perhaps I should explain.

For a while now, I've had a skin condition on my face. Brown patches have developed on my cheeks, followed by nubbly, scaly, raised areas. I've pretended I wasn't worried about it for a long time, and wore increasing amounts of foundation, but while we were on holiday, Pat mentioned it in company, thinking he was pointing out a dirty mark on my cheek, and I found myself crying. At this point, I realised it was making me very unhappy, and I had to get it looked at. Cue trip to doctor, command to utilise Factor 30+ cream on face at all time, and impending date with dermatologist. Its not anything malign, thank Gods, but nevertheless.

I've always been very lucky with my skin, which has rather made it worse. I have sported a pale, even, almost porcelain complexion for many years. I have to admit that I wasn't as thorough with the sun tan cream in my twenties as I ought to have been (youth of today take note - it WILL happen to you!), and did rather more lying on the beach during my MSc at Portsmouth than was strictly necessary. But I have always worked hard with the Cleanse-Tone-Moisturise routine too, so I figured I was okay.

Now when I look in the mirror, I see Oliver Cromwell!

Well, the GP says it's not warts, or melanoma, but something unpronounceable, which is a relief, but I am left with a rabid obsession with finding a mineral foundation with the highest SPF possible, and the possibility that the crusty lumps may not be removable, at least without scarring.

I don't mind the wrinkles and the greying hair, which at least I can colour. I can just afford electrolysis for the increasing number of black bristles coming through on my chin. I can do my yoga and eat healthily to manage my incipient tum. And I can look to Judy Dench and Helen Mirren as role models. But don't let anyone kid you, girls, this getting old shit is hell, so be prepared. And use a high SPF.

Wise words

2011-06-14T20:54:00.000+01:00

Pat's friend Alex came round last night. We had lots of fun, and talked the hind legs off several donkeys. Lots of wise words. But I think possibly the wisest of the evening belonged to Alex, and I think I am going to carry them with me for a long time (or at least every time I am tempted to spend too much money on tickets for the Euromillions lottery). Alex said:

Happiness is loving what you already have.

Thank you, Alex. You're tops.

Creative Process

2011-06-12T17:15:00.000+01:00

A couple of my notebooks - with home made covers - and Andrew Cowan's book

Firstly, the inciting incidents:

I got Andrew Cowan’s new book, The Art of Writing Fiction, from the library last week, and it really is brilliant. Cowan came to give us a guest class when I was on the Diploma of Creative Writing course at the University of East Anglia (where he is now Director of the MA programme), and he was excellent. Most of what I remember from his class is in the chapter on observational journals, and reading has made me very reflective.

Short story illustration 1986 - don't ask me what its about, I can't remember!

I’ve also just started Alisa Burke’s new online class, Watercolour Bliss, which is just as its title suggests. Looking back over my old portfolio has made me realise just how much I am learning with her, but also allowed me to see the big holes in my art practice. My painting technique is so much better now, but I used to draw all the time – I used to illustrate my own stories, as the picture above shows. Doing full time Art ‘A’ levels, of course, gives you a lot of time to make art, but I can see how much better my drawing technique was then, compared with how it is now. Practicing every day really does make a difference.

When I was working on my writing diploma, I took my notebooking really seriously too. I worked hard on recording all those observational details and playing with language. And while I know my writing has improved so much in the intervening years, Cowan has helped me see how much I have let that practice go, and how much I could gain from reinstating it.

Pages from my current notebook

So I am considering reinvigorating my creative process by going ‘Back to Basics’. I think a good deal of this will be about what I choose to draw, as well as the details I choose to write about, because this is what motivates me. And that means allowing myself to fail a bit as I get back into the swing. Which takes courage. But I think the Habit of Art, as Auden called it, is worth taking a risk for, don’t you?

Artists for Respect

2011-06-08T11:21:00.000+01:00

A lot of debate has been going on in the blogosphere lately about the issue of intellectual copyright over artwork and workshop content. I am a bit hesitant to weigh into such contentious waters, for fear of causing offense, but this is a subject dear to my heart, because I too risk a lot by putting my writing and drawings on my blog. Once its out there, its out there. Its hard to know where the line is, and sometimes I've found myself crossing it unwittingly as well.

But there is an etiquette developing and I wholly support this movement. There is a delicate balance between saving our intellectual property and being able to share freely within the community.

When does the blog post you sweated blood over become someone else's cut and paste slap-up job? What if I shared sections of my novels or short stories here, and then discovered them published under someone else's name? I don't profess to understanding the issues of copyright, but I agree with Pam Carriker and Rice Freeman-Zachary, and others, that it needs to be discussed.

In the Garden Part 2

2011-06-06T11:03:00.000+01:00

It's raining today. What a relief. In the meantime, here are some more pics.

In the Garden

2011-06-05T10:48:00.000+01:00

I thought you might like to see some of the wonderful things our garden has been doing lately, despite the dire shortage of rain...

Scottish Scribbles

2011-06-02T10:24:00.000+01:00

Laphroaig Bay

I'm still coming down off my rant about the Robin Day sofa yesterday, so in the meantime I thought you might like to see the art I did while we were away. Looking at it now, I'm not so happy with the painting, but its the first time in a long time that I have painted outside, so I guess its not bad. I like the drawing of Arby better, but I think maybe it still needs a bit more work.

Arby sleeping

My Habitat

2011-06-01T10:50:00.000+01:00

La Corbusier's Villa Savoye

Can you have a revelation of self-knowledge from a furniture store? I did yesterday. Let me explain.

I was trundling through Norwich, doing my chores as I often do on a Tuesday afternoon, and I came around the corner to see horrible, garish 'CLOSING DOWN' signs all over my favourite furniture shop, Habitat. On the way home, I told Pat of my outrage, and he just shrugged, and said, 'yeah, didn't you know?'

How could he be so nonchalant? This is HABITAT we are talking about here!!!!! (Excuse the exclamation marks, but I want to get over the emphasis - this is serious, people!)

And thats when it hit me: under this crusty, heritage exterior beats the heart of a radical Modernist. Habitat is the shop I have always aspired to shopping at. Ever since I first studied architects like Mies Van Der Rohe and Le Corbusier as a teenager, I have been secretly in love with quality modern design. When the National Lottery first started, I dreamed of buying a house and filling it with Habitat goodies. Its a shop I love wandering around. It makes me feel calm and peaceful. I treat myself to visits. I made the mistake of assuming it would always be there. I never dreamed I would once again live in a place where Habitat wasn't.

I am haunted by all those wasted visits just looking, when I should have been stocking up on GIBRALTAR glasses, BISTRO tableware and SATEEN bedlinen against the time when IKEA and the banking crisis reduced my favorite store to a shadow of its former self. If only I had known.

Okay, the demise of Norwich's branch probably means very little to you, especially if you live in London or North Carolina, and on the face of it, it should be irrelevant to me. Its not as if I can afford that Robin Day couch I've always been hankering after, and it would be difficult to make it work in a small 19th century farm cottage with a serious clutter problem anyway. And frankly, you probably always thought I was the Laura Ashley type. But everybody needs something to aspire to.

Vintage Robin Day Conran sofa

The moral of this story is that reading all those interiors magazines has failed to help me discover my personal interior style, but the effects of the credit crisis have. I want a Le Corbusier house with glass walls and Barcelona chairs.

Mies Van Der Rohe's Barcelona chair and ottoman

My name is Rebecca and I am a Modernist.

Reflections on Scottish Islands

2011-05-30T11:06:00.000+01:00

Well, I am managing to plough through that twitchy phase you get when you come home from a holiday,and reflecting the marvellous experience that was Islay. And a few things come to mind:

All that fretting about what to pack and what to wear? What a waste of energy that was! Let me tell you, the only thing anyone wears on a Scottish island is what will keep them a) warm and b) dry. And with winds averaging 50-70mph, everyone looks like they've been dragged through a hedge backwards. Don't worry about your hair, or your frocks. Wear waterproofs and take a woolly hat and gloves. Believe me, I have come home with a new revelation about just how unimportant fashion really is!
Islay feels like the edge of the world. Jura really is. I always fancied running away to live somewhere like that. Now I know I just couldn't do it, even with the internet. It's just too remote. On the other hand, having now been to Jura, I really get George Orwell's '1984' now.
Wow, Norfolk is amazing. Coming back to this bucolic, rolling landscape, with its hedges and lush copse, I feel like the luckiest person in the world to live where I do. I love to look at mountains, but their energy makes me panicky. Better the slow moving, mellow energy of the lowlands for me.
Going back to packing, Pat and I only took one suitcase between us, and it was more than enough. I was very impressed with myself for packing so light.
I love flying. At least, I love the going up and the coming down. The bit in the middle is boring. I quite like airports too. What I really hate is the standing in queues and the way it makes people so vicious. It was a good moment to practice Loving kindness when we stood in the queue to go through security at Stansted for three quarters of an hour. Of course, I didn't. I got just as stroppy as everyone else.
Scottish people are just so nice. Everyone we met had time to talk and laugh. At Glasgow and Islay airports, the security people actually made the process a pleasure, whereas the atmosphere at Stansted was positively poisonous. On the plane home from Islay, I met a lovely old chap of 86 who had grown up on Gigha, and told me some wonderful stories about what it was like in the old days to travel amongst the islands. He was going to Glasgow for a hospital appointment, which put a whole new perspective on driving to the N&N for one!
Islay is huge! So much to see and we only scratched the surface. I think you'd need at least two trips to see it with any sense of completeness.

I am sure there are plenty of other things I could say, but I will save them for another day (since I have been told that I blog too infrequently and I am going to have to up my posting rate!) All I can say is, go to Islay - its a real experience!

Made it back alive!

2011-05-28T20:40:00.000+01:00

The Paps of Jura

Scotland. Islay and Jura to be precise. It rained. It blew. It was fantastic.

The Singing Sands with Highland Coo

Best moment? So many. Lying in bed listening to the hail on the roof? Folk band doing a three hours set in a soggy tent in the rain just for the pleasure of playing? Handmade chocolates? Painting the bay at Laphroaig? Discovering that rumours of the decease of Shortie, the Ardbeg dog, are premature? Priceless.

Summer home of the Lords of the Isles

SHORTIE LIVES!

whoosh!

2011-05-21T16:40:00.000+01:00

Clouds over Arran by Gordon Baird, from the BBC Scotland website.

Off to Islay tomorrow. In case you are wondering, its in the Inner Hebrides, and its pronounced 'EYE-lah' The latest weather forecast for the area was for 50-60 mph winds, driving rain and max temps of 12 degrees. It is forecast to be 22 degrees in Norfolk tomorrow. Ever wonder what the hell you are doing??? I am hoping to get some painting done, and may even be able to post while we are away - but don't count on it. If not, have a groovy week everybody, and I will tell you all about it when I get back.

Worrywart

2011-05-19T16:31:00.000+01:00

Sailing past the Paps of Jura (Via)

Getting ready for a holiday is a difficult time for me. Its hard to take care of myself when I am feeling so stressed about getting everything done. I don't know why I am getting myself in such a state. I have plenty of time. When I think of how I used to organise day meetings for 700 delegates, or weekend residential conferences for 200, you'd think getting two of us out of the door would be a cinch! I've always got very stressed and anxious about travelling, probably because I don't cope well with change. For me, a holiday is rather more like an assault course to be endured than a good rest. I always come back feeling like I need a month in bed to recover.

This time I am going to make it different. I intend to see it as a PROCESS to be ENJOYED (alien concept there). I want to be mindful of each and every step on the journey. I want to engineer moments of stillness in the midst of the DOING, in order to stop and reflect. I want to have memories as well as photographs.

Taking a leaf from Virginia's book

2011-05-08T11:04:00.000+01:00

I keep this portrait of VW on my desk to inspire me

I've been feeling bad about not having written much lately. Being so ill again has forced me to stop and reassess my productivity mindset, to learn that doing things just for the pleasure of it, rather than because I OUGHT to, is necessary for my wellbeing. I am having to force myself to accept the necessity of abandoning goals, and learn to do things for enjoyment:

If it ain't fun, it won't get done!

(That's my new motto.) So, just for the pleasure of it, I started re-reading Quentin Bell's biography of Virginia Woolf, who is one of my heroines.

Woolf spent a great deal of her life in bed, under enforced rest, because of her psychiatric problems. She was not even allowed to read or write - which to me seems grounds enough for going stark, staring mad, but that was the treatment then. Reading about the aftermath of her violent psychotic spell of 1915-16, I was struck that I am in the same position, though for different reasons. Out of this period of isolation and forced rest came the genesis of her greatest works. She was obsessively productive throughout her life, generating a vast body of work including essays, hundreds of book reviews, short stories and plays, as well as her famous diary. She was driven by goals, and she didn't take it happily when she was forced to stop work. But out of the resting came some of the greatest novels in the English language.

While I am not suggesting that I am on a par with Woolf, its a model I think I need to emulate. I have learnt a hard lesson in recent weeks of consistent illness, and this time I have to take it on board. I can't go on like this. I have to find another way. Resting is too important. And perhaps taking a leaf out of VW's doctors' book is the answer.

Critter Encounter

2011-04-23T17:44:00.000+01:00

I was sitting in my back yard this afternoon, reading a book and relaxing, when under the fence ambled a white ferret. Yep. A ferret. It had a good look around and then embarked on examining me. I have to confess all I could think about was a) where had it escaped from, and b) was it going to run up my trouser leg? (I know, completely cliched.). It turned out to belong to the gamekeeper next door, though how it had escaped from its pen I didn't manage to establish. Never mind, the point is, it was was an unexpected delight. Ferrets are such cheerful creatures. It certainly cheered my day up. Maybe I should get a couple and take them for walks on a lead....

Two things

2011-04-21T20:01:00.000+01:00

Had to make a really tough decision today in support of my wellbeing. It's hard to let people down because you are really not well enough, especially when it's family. But I know it's the right thing to do. I have to listen to my body.
On the other hand, as if in compensation, today I got to hold a real life duckling in my hands, and stroke it. No, really. It was probably one of the most beautiful things I have ever seen. Utterly perfect. Many thanks to George for the opportunity (though I suspect he shouldn't have done it.)

Thank You

2011-04-20T14:29:00.000+01:00

I just wanted to say a heartfelt thank you to everyone who has sent kind words and support to me over the last few days. I have really appreciated all your kindness. I especially want to say a public thank you to my wonderful husband who has looked after me so patiently, and brought me these roses yesterday, knowing how much they would cheer me up. And there is nothing a girl loves more than being bought flowers! Aren't they lovely?

Came back from the doctor's this morning with a fist full of new pills which hopefully will solve the problems for the moment. For the first time in days I am beginning to feel a little more human, and much more comfortable.

So thank you everyone, I am really, really grateful to have such wonderful friends.

luv Bex*

The Problem with Mindfulness...

2011-04-17T19:20:00.000+01:00

As regular readers will know, I've been following the mindfulness meditation programme laid out in Jon Kabat-Zinn's book, Full Catastrophe Living. Its quite hard core (45 mins of Vipassana or yoga daily, plus 20-45 mins sitting meditation daily, increasing as you go along). While I haven't always managed to fit it all in, its been very helpful in lots of ways.

But I've come up against a wall. Mindfulness doesn't seem to help me with the pain I'm in. Why try to be in the present moment, when the present moment is a horrible place to be? (Yes, I know all about that acceptance stuff, that's all very well if it doesn't hurt.) Right now I am feeling terrible, and it seems like my imagination is the only thing thing that is relieving the misery.

On the other hand, its a thick book, and I haven't got to the chapter on pain yet, so maybe I'm missing an important piece of the jigsaw! ( I'm pretty sure the Buddha must have thought of an answer for this anyway.)

This week's lesson...

2011-04-08T22:07:00.000+01:00

Ideas in unexpected places - John Lennon or Jesus?

Here are four things I have learnt this week, in no particular order:

Anticipation is a big issue for me. I worry about what I may or may not feel like after I do something, to the point where I end up not doing things that would probably do me good. This is common with ME patients, and may even be part of the 'illness thinking' mindset that doctors speak of in relation to sufferers of chronic illness. Awareness is the first step to changing, and the mindfulness practise I am doing at the moment is really helping with that. I have a difficult weekend coming up, and I am aware that my anticipation machine has kicked in, so I am being mindful and its helping so much.

Incubation is good. I was reading something the other day on having an ideas incubator. When you come up with lots of really good ideas, tuck them away and let them mature. I usually announce fabby new ideas on this blog and then get bored with them and move on. Instead, I am going to put them in my incubator and let them mature. And focus on my main project at the moment, which is 'The Butler Did It...'

Running away is important. A friend came over on Thursday, when I was feeling really stressed, and we ran away for the day to the seaside. We ate fish and chips, got smeary with ketchup, walked on the beach, then huddled behind the beach hut kiosk out of the wind, to keep the sand out of our ice creams. When I put the key in the front door at the end of the day, I realised I felt so refreshed and renewed. A day not thinking about my current worries had enabled me to get some perspective. I now feel much more up to coping with what life is throwing right now. That said, after my father died, my mother and I used to run away for day trips together when things got too much for us. She would ring the school and tell them I was sick, and then we would scoot off somewhere to visit a castle or walk on the downs. It was one of the best gifts she could have shared with me at such a tough time for both of us, and its a habit I have retained. But I had forgotten how refreshing it can be until yesterday.

Life is too short to spend clicking. My name is Rebecca and I am a blog addict. I spend way too much time on the internet, especially when I am researching an idea. I mean, I am losing hours, whole chunks of days, here people! Time to cut down. This weekend I am going cold turkey. Wish me luck!

Whats going on

2011-04-05T21:46:00.000+01:00

Tulips snapped at Norfolk Lavender last year

The latest news from the Barrow Burrow in bullet point form because I feel too crap to write at length but want to post:

Became a Great Auntie yesterday - an 8lb boy born to Lucy, my brother's daughter, and Ben, her partner.
I didn't get shortlisted for the Pratchett Prize last week. But I'm cool with that. I'll write some more about why soon.
Very bad weekend energy-wise, but I'm cool with that too.
Pat is grumpy because Spurs just lost.
Pat is also grumpy because he is trying to lose a stone in four weeks before the cricket season starts.
Therefore we are on a low carb diet. My tummy is much happier as a result.
Ducklings on the pond out back, this year's first.
Frogs in the pond out back, doing lots of 'cuddling'.
Not so consistent with the mindfulness meditation so far, but what I am doing managing to do is really helping.
Have declared April a Self Care Month.
Am saving for a new laptop, and feeling like I am committing an act of extreme betrayal, because I love this one so much, knackered tho it is.
My name is Rebecca and I am a chocolate addict.
The garden is starting to look green again, and Pat mowed the lawn, despite the duck glowering at us from her nest under the hedge.
My counsellor/guru thinks I should write erotic fiction.
Toying with starting a new blog about my fixation with notebooks, journals, planners, filofaxes and all kinds of stationary. Trying to think of a funky name (leave your ideas in the comments section below!)

Happy April everybody! Spring is here!

I tried, I really did....

2011-04-01T11:09:00.000+01:00

D H Lawrence, famous son of Nottingham

Last night I watched the second episode of the BBC's new adaptation of D.H Lawrence's 'Women in Love'. Then I went to bed and lay there, feeling more and more angry and not really being able to understand why.

The thing is, I have some history with this. I was born in Nottinghamshire. Most of my family comes from there, and I still have some relatives living in Nottingham. My parents romance was played out against the background of the Lace Market and the Trent. My father went to the same school as Lawrence. Lawrence also lived in Zennor, in Cornwall, during the First World War, and its a place I love. (If you want to know more about that, read the wonderful 'Zennor in Darkness' by Helen Dunmore, in which he appears.) And Lawrence was one of the great Modernist writers of the 20th century, along with Joyce and Woolf. Woolf is one of my great heroines, of course. I 'did' the Modernists for my degree, read Lady Chatterley and various short stories, as well as Lawrence's essays on American Literature, which was necessary for my American Studies degree component. So I have every reason to feel obliged to like D H Lawrence.

But the thing is, I don't.

Oh, I've tried and tried. I admire his 'project' of promoting being in closer touch with our bodies, and in our increasingly 'dis-embodied' society, I think its so much more important to get out of our heads and into our bodies. Few people have suffered from this as much as I have.

But the thing is, when Lawrence writes about sex, he has to do it in such a roundabout way because of the sensitivities of the time, and because of his philosophy, that its almost impossible to understand what he's on about. And then he'll go off on a rant about class consciousness. During last night's episode, I could hardly make out what anyone was arguing about, because the dialogue was so obtuse. In the end, I just wanted to knock all their heads together. There have been all kinds of accusations that Lawrence is actually a misogynist, and not the feminist he claimed to be. He does leave me feeling a bit squeamish about his portrayal of women.

AA Gill reviewed the first episode in the Sunday Times last week, and said that Lawrence's project is simply outdated. We don't need it anymore. I hate to agree with such a creature, but I think now he may be right. The only part of that episode that seemed important and touching to me was the tender re-ignition of the parental Brangwens' marriage. I think the recognition that love is not something confined to the beautiful young, but is crucial to the happiness of all ages, is the only lesson left to take away from the old horndog.

Book Blurb

2011-03-30T10:10:00.000+01:00

I came up with the blurb to go with my new book last night, lying in bed at 2am. Its the daft sort of thing I do in the middle of the night. The blurb is the bit on the back of the cover that makes you want to buy the book. Its one of the things you can write to help focus your mind on your plot. Here's my first bash at the blurb for 'The Butler Did It'....

Benedict, 6th Viscount Ashcroft, is a man with two problems. He's a gay man in 1880s London. And he is desperately in need of a male heir.

Sarah, Viscountess Ashcroft, is the woman he marries. Consumed with love for a man who can never return her feelings, she teeters on the edge of despair and disaster.

George Crawford is their butler. He knows the dark secret in Lord Ashcroft's past, and holds the key to Lady Ashcroft's future.

When the three enter into a secret pact, they unwittingly unleash passions that threaten to destroy them all.

One thing's for certain...
......The Butler Did It!

I'd love to hear your feedback - but please leave your comments below and not on Facebook. Many thanks!

Listen... Can you hear it? That grinding sound?

2011-03-15T20:07:00.000Z

Doodled Dahlias - this is what I need to do when I'm grumpy

That grinding sound, dear reader, is me grinding my teeth.

I had a big light bulb moment in my counselling session last week, and I am carrying it with me into a new way of being (I hope). Along with starting a new programme of body awareness as recommended in Jon Kabat-Zinn's wonderful book, 'Full Catastrophe Living' in order to tackle my chronic pain, I am trying to actively listen to both my body and my moods.

So, the grinding. I get crabby a lot. And grind my teeth. I find myself ranting regularly inside my own head. Recently I have noticed that this rage is linked to frustration. And it usually goes away when I do something creative.

For instance, yesterday, I was in the foulest mood all day. By the time Pat came home at tea time, I was ready for a scrap. But instead of picking a fight with my beloved, I tried to think about what was pissing me off so much.

Turns out, Rebecca was pissed off because she wanted to write, and had been flaking about all day, putting it off.

So I duly sat down to write. Two and a half thousand words later, and shaking slightly from the release of tension, I realised how much better life can be when I get out of my own way and do what I need to do.

So I am resolved that next time I feel angry, frustrated, grumpy, sad, miserable, weepy, spiteful, snide, or any of the above without reasonable cause, I need to recognise it as a sign that I am stopping myself doing what I want and need to do. And I will sit down to write or draw. Something. Anything. It doesn't matter what. And that crabbiness will go away (because it always does).

So next time you hear that grinding noise, time how long it lasts. Because that will be how long it takes me to quit punishing myself for wanting to be me, and just get on with it!

Sticky Problems

2011-03-07T17:37:00.004Z

I've been doing quite a bit of writing and drawing lately, despite constant extreme fatigue, so I am feeling productive in spite of everything. The new book is coming on nicely, although I am not writing at the frantic pace that I was - my 'bull at a gate' method needs to be reined in somewhat! I've started coming up against sub-plots,which severely complicate my 'just write the bloody thing' mode, so I've been trying to organise the scenes I have either written, or have in my mind, into a meaningful order.

Hey presto! The Yellow Sticky Wall!

Each sticky has a scene written on it, and can be moved around to change the chronological order of events. It's my version of a data flow diagram for writing purposes.

Now, yellow stickies are good because you can move them around. They are not so good, in that they don't seem to stick for very long. (You can see some are already peeling off in the picture.) The result is that when I come into the study the morning after a busy plotting session, the floor is covered in an avalanche of scraps of yellow paper! (Will Self doesn't seem to have this problem from the photos I have seen of his study wall, which is covered in neat lines of perfectly adhered yellow slips. I wonder how he does it?)

Eagle-eyed readers will notice that the surface to which my plot notes are adhered is actually my precious advertising board from a distant visit to Norwich by Iain Banks, one of my fave authors, kindly donated to this throbbing fan by friends working at Waterstones. (He's Scottish - what can I say?) You will notice that stickies are not arranged over his adorable naughty face. That would be a sticky too far.

I bet Iain Banks doesn't have trouble getting his yellow stickies to stick...