New paintings and regular art updates.
Normally by now I would be showing you beautiful photos of my garden, but I hardly go out the back door anymore. My hubby used to carry in bags of compost and I would refill pots with it and buy plants to fill them. But now I need help. I want to be sure I won’t fall or trip up! Must get some help. X
Blue seems turquoise these days. My cataracts have shifted my colour vision. I see it in every television programme. I noticed it a few months ago. I had thought it was because a special new colour had been chosen on fashion grounds. But now I’m pretty certain it’s me. Hope it will be sorted out if and when I have an operation. At least I am in good company with the famous impressionist Claude Monet.
If all the bees were gone
There’d be no flowers
So no fruit, no vegetables
No more blossom.
We could still have wind blown pollen
So grain would be possible?
Maybe….
Not much choice
Porridge or bread?
Let’s save our bees
And pollinating insects
We need them.
My garden is overgrown, particularly the front hedge which is trees and bushes. The local council has sent me a warning letter to get it cut back in 14 days. But I’m physically not capable of doing it, I’m on a low income and my garden is a haven for birds, squirrels, sometimes hedgehogs and bats. I’m going to try and get it done, but will have to rely on friends as my hubby died 18 months ago.
What is worse is I struggle with anxiety and having a letter addressed to the both of us really upset me. I found myself crying on the phone to a council worker. It makes me feel like my heart is breaking. I just wish hubby was still here. Meanwhile I will try and plead for some more time.
#earlywork a portrait I did of my then boyfriend, later husband when I was about 20 at college. It’s oil on canvas. I haven’t managed to photograph it all as there’s stuff in the way. The green dot on his face is a beam of light from a crystal glass mobile I’ve got up at my window.
Hubby played a prophet in one of the Mystery Plays a few years ago. It was outside but his big booming voice could be heard by the audience sitting on the green. He could project his voice over the traffic noise. If he had been bought up in a more middle class environment I’m sure he would have been an actor. But mental health meant he struggled to remember all his words. We also did the local amateur panto together. He got a pretend Oscar one year for most enthusiastic entrance (or something like that). He was a marvellous, memorable man.
80 years ago, on the 8th of May 1945, Hitler was defeated in the second world war. But that was only in Europe, the war actually ended on 2nd September of the same year when Japan surrendered.
It’s significant that it is the 80th year as it is probably the last time that many veterans from the war will be able to celebrate it because if they were 21 (start of adulthood) when they joined up they would be 101 or older now.
Memories fade but this is a way to remember the joy of the ending of the conflict, although not for everyone. We should remember those that were injured or wounded, either in the military or civilian. Those that were made homeless or those that lost relatives and friends. I’m glad and sad in equal measure.
Today I had a check up to see if I was suitable for cataract surgery. I went to a clean, bright, smart clinic. I had to have transport because I was not allowed to drive.
After a short wait and having read the booklet about cataract surgery I went to see the technician to have eye drops put in and then photos taken of my lenses. She also did a check of my eyes looking at an eye chart with and without a small grid that you had to try and focus through. I found I could see the chart better with it, less fuzzy. Finally they checked my blood pressure which was a bit high but the bottom figure was OK as I managed to relax.
A short wait and then I saw the optometrist. This time she checked my retina and also the pressures within my eyes that would indicate glaucoma. Everything was OK. Now I just have to choose when I have the operation as I have other things to deal with before I can get the first eye done.
Wish me luck. X
I’m involved in the Penkhull Mystery Plays and we had a read through of the whole play yesterday. I just decided to doodle what I think the main baddie in the play could look like. Her hair is a tangle of flowers and weeds and twigs. Sharp faced, but without the beak of a nose and hooked chin of traditional depictions of witches. She’s more punk than ancient. I could imagine piercings and tattoos too.
We used to dream of visiting Cardiff
The Welsh capital city
Where you went to Uwist university
But I was getting ill
I couldn’t drive there
And your anxiety held me still
We’d go next summer
Before it was too late
But we ran out of time
That was our fate
Never to see the city
Where you studies science
Now there is no visit
Only cold silence.
Mallaband-Brown