
Palpitating
Beating
Shuddering
Ticking
Heart ache
Soft
Emotions
Feelings
Meaning
Healthy
Pumping
Pressure
Blood
Peaceful
Heart
Love
❤️
New paintings and regular art updates.

Palpitating
Beating
Shuddering
Ticking
Heart ache
Soft
Emotions
Feelings
Meaning
Healthy
Pumping
Pressure
Blood
Peaceful
Heart
Love
❤️

May 2020. This is an urban sketch because its ouside drawn in real time. I’m pleased with some of the details I added, like our plastic garden chair with the cut out curves in the back. When I sat and drew our then outside cat sitting by the summerhouse door. I haven’t been in the summer house much since then. I guess things got to me a bit. I didn’t shake then… I need to start feeling like I can be less isolated. But because my balance isn’t as good I always feel like I might tumble over. My hubby is good at leaving things in the way and I’m rubbish at bending over to move them. How did I get like this? It’s easier to hide away in the house. I need to try and sort myself out, but just getting doctors appointments is difficult. Anyway enough feeling sorry for myself. X

Just to sit
at a table,
half of beer,
in my hand,
a quiet river,
flowing by.
A dream of freedom,
no distractions,
quiet and relaxing
time to rest.
No stress no worries,
just a dream,
the world passing
slowly leaving
me behind.

Image by N. F. Mirza from her book.
I don’t do reviews…
But (you know one was coming). I just sat down to read ” Swinging Sanity” a book of poetry by my friend N. F. Mirza, who I know as ‘stoneronarollercoaster’ at WordPress.
I’ve known her for a while and found out she was a writer and now a published poet. Her book is a small volume. But it’s full to bursting with poetry full of emotion. As she moves through life, using it to discover her mental health and wellbeing.
The poems are forceful, I’m no poetry critic, but I found them easy to read. Some of them touched raw nerves, and you can see her heart torn open in many of them. I particularly liked Ocean and I become one.
ISBN 9798618202992.

She was staring straight ahead.
Looking into the distance,
Into the past or the future?
No one knows.
Staring hard, vision blurred,
Tears forgotten.
Memory faded.
Staring at what?
Old hysteria?
New apathy?
Hidden thoughts,
Was it fate?
No one will ever know.

Don’t you know I love you?
Don’t you know I care about you?
It’s bleak out here
It’s cold and grey.
My heart is lost, broken, destroyed.
It hurts that you don’t care,
It hurts that you’ve gone away,
You are here in body but not in spirit,
You changed before my eyes
Your memory has glazed over
Milky white, foggy, out of focus
I can’t break in, I can’t get close
I still love you
Won’t you remember to love me too?

I don’t get angry very often but my head is thumping and my heart is pounding. Its making me feel ill I feel so livid. It’s really a trivial thing. I made a mistake and have admitted it. (it would be so much easier if I could explain).
I wrote about the situation here, but realised that I don’t want to get into blaming someone or getting angry at someone on line, its not sensible or helpful. So I have deleted what I said.
I hope my heart will slow down soon, but I still feel annoyed. Is there such a thing as righteous anger? I wanted to shout that they were being stupid, but I bit my lip. I have bottled it up inside. I need to calm down. Life does throw rocks at you sometimes.

You know when you are bored when…You decide to take a photo of your empty glass…with your nose because you can’t hold the glass, your tablet and press the shutter on the screen at the same time.
Today consisted of sleeping in till late, cooking lunch, taking some rubbish down to the tip, going shopping, tidying up and reheating yesterdays left overs for our evening meal.
Some days are just boring.
The best thing about today? Hearing an abridged version of Jaws on Radio 4. Two and a half hours long, some wonderful descriptions in a frightening story, it was read out by a narrator rather than having a cast of characters. Brilliant.
But you say why are you bored? Why not do something? Basically because I get tired, and I get down. I don’t think I’m depressed exactly, just looking for my mojo to come back. Sometimes life is like that, especially when you start getting a bit older. The safety of the house is like a warm nest. A warm blanket , easier to snuggle down and ignore the world. …
And the world is wonky at the moment, the politics is bonkers, right wing politicians seem to be ascendant, poverty is increasing. Even the age that people die, which had been increasing in this country has suddenly seen a down turn. And don’t ask me about Brexit (if you have even heard if it) its not something I agree with and 52 percent of the population here voted for it…..climate change is happening, animals are becoming extinct……is it any wonder that as the ×÷=t hits the fan I just need a duvet day sometimes?
I remember as a child going on a march with my mother, I was only 5 or 6 so I can’t remember why, or what it was about. I remember seeing and hearing racism when I was a child and questioning it… now I hide away, turn my face away, look at stupid kitten videos instead! What changes us, what forces impinge on us to stop us caring as much as we did?
I want to be more caring about homelessness, unemployment, benefit cuts, modern day slavery, credit crunches, cuts to education and the NHS. Austerity, privatisation, plastic pollution, nuclear accidents, inflation, food banks, cuts in Police, increases in zero hours contracts.
It’s all too much. They call I compassion fatigue, I call it compassion exhaustion….
We need, all of us, to be more caring, for everyone else, not just ourselves. I’ve tried to help people in my job for years, it all got a bit too much.
So yes, maybe it’s not actual boredom, but an inability to focus because there is too much going on to deal with. Withdrawal from the outside world seems preferable at the moment.
X

Insomnia bites at my mind.
Makes sleep impossible,
Hides the remote to my dreams,
It gives no respite to my need to rest,
I am a prisoner held in its bright grasp.
Sleep, eludes, escapes, disappears.
5am ..the sun is rising on another day….
Shall I try again for a brief nap?
The click clack of the clock invades my ears,
Makes me hear the dawn chorus….
The radio susserating quietly by my bed…will I drift on …
Onto a narcoleptic ocean, softly, softly, gently falling…
AWAKE!

How to deal with rejection?
I entered three paintings for our local 3 Counties Open art exhibition, but yet again all of them have been rejected. I thought they had a good chance, but no, nothing. I’ve entered in the past and been successful on a few occasions. …maybe my idea of art is too different from anyone else?
I have not added photos if them I don’t want to remind myself…
It’s a hard thing to accept, I know its nothing in the middle of all the bad things happening in the world. But I feel a gut wrenching sadness…I’m clearly not good at this….
Thinking about it, really it is a personal choice by the judge’s. There is nothing in the entry form to give you a clue what they like, and in any case, I think art should be original not made for a criteria. I guess they didn’t fit in with the rest of the show. I don’t know if I will bother with the opening, I can be very self critical and I might end up getting upset.
So, I will do what I always do, carry on with my own ideas. Not get too despondent. Life carries on. I need to take a breath and relax, get over it and start over…
I try too hard
To make you see,
My art is mine, alone to me.
I know I am frustrated by rejection
But life’s like that,
I must temper my reaction.
My pain will be brief
No death here,
Just feeling bereft
Not shedding a tear.
I will carry on
I will go ahead,
My art is my own
I will not regret.
Xx