Tag: Writing

Time Ticks

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PicsArt_1536439451689It does! I started writing this over 12 hours ago but then the battery on my tablet went flat so I had to wait until now .

Anyway, time does tick by, sometimes I know exactly when the alarm is going to go off, and it does. I can wake up a second before the alarm clock goes off….nothing is clicking or whirring or spinning to give me a cue or a clue. Same with the alarm on our oven, last night I got up from my chair to check it just before it went off.

One explanation is the brain has tiny cells beating regularly giving us a sense of time. There are also electric nodes in your heart that regulate your heartbeat, and your breathing is a regular rhythm allowing you to get just the right amount of air.

But what is time, why do we feel times arrow? Why does a cup fall and then break as it hits the floor? Why isn’t it on the floor then bouncing back up onto the table, reforming from smashed to solid in a second? There is something called entropy, everything breaks down over time. Everything tends towards chaos. The Universe is cooling, as space expands. Astrophysicists speak of the heat death of the universe as everything spreads out and cools towards absolute zero. Galaxies are flying away from each other. If things continue, in many billions or trillions of years, we would have completely black skies, no stars in sight. Our Sun will have cooled to a husk of burnt matter and all the other Stars will fly off away for us. There is something called red shift, as galaxies move away their light shifts towards the red end of the spectrum, the larger the red shift the faster they are moving. There are theories about things called dark energy and dark matter that try to explain this, but I wouldn’t know where to start with that aspect of space time.

Time ticks for everything, although time may not actually exist, it might just be our way of measuring the passing of things happening, but not understanding the universe. But if it is real there may be an advantage of time. The end of the universe or more likely its continuous, infinite existence, will not happen in our time. But a long long long time in the future.

 

Looking out

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The eye peeps out, looking into the street, one clear square of glass, the rest opaque, hiding the room beyond.

A glimpse of an eye, now gone. The rusting bars of the window still hold firm grip of the blackened glass. No splits or cracks, just that small patch where once there was..a blue eye? Almost missed, only glanced at.

Do I knock on the door next to the window? Or ignore it and walk by. The dilemma is not knowing which to choose. Who (or what ) is in there? It could be a homeless person, a drunk, a security guard. I am alone, walking down an old alley way. No, I dare not chance knocking, I don’t know what the outcome might be. I might come back in daylight. I leave the window and eye behind, walking quickly….

But steps are following me……..

Love, locked shut

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You shackled my heart,

Love, locked shut,

You closed the gate and threw away the key.

Your love rusted away,

Stopping the blood,

Iron filings instead of red corpuscles…

Bitter cold rain blended with tears,

No love here,

No more love, no more light,

Fastened in and imprisoned,

The dove turned to stone.

Take flight through one tiny gap.

Find new love,

Unbarred.

 

summer flavours

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Summer and its flavours,

Crisp and crunchy flowers,

Take us through the hours,

of summer bright and light.

Hot and tasty bowers,

Nasturtium flowers are sour,

But sweet plums ripen here

In the shining Sun.

Before the ripe tomatoes,

Before the mellow mists,

Before the damp of Autumn,

Summer gives its gifts.

Sunshine and wild showers

Heat for many hours

Summer cooks its fruit,

Raspberries and pears.

Oranges and almonds

Appear on our tables

Strawberries of fable

Melt with mint and cream.

Plums and pomegranates

Begonias and daisies,

Lobelia and lemons,

Summer coloured sweet.

Now come the dark days,

Shorter every hour

Equinox is coming

Day will turn  to night.

Never lose the summer

Keep it in your mind.

Smell and taste its wonders

Soon to burst again.

I love the summer,

I love the light,

I hate the winter,

Brings on dark and night.

Too many books?

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How many books is too many? I was counting ours a few years ago and when I got to over 1000 I gave up. We had books in all the rooms except the bathroom but they have also had to be moved out of the kitchen now it’s been modernised. If I could sneak a few cookbooks in I would, but then the books on trains would follow…

What books do I like?

Biography, Science, Astronomy, Autobiography, Physics, Maths, Science Fiction, Science Fantasy, Fantasy, Train books, Novels, Thrillers, Art books. Books about Pottery and Ceramics. Books about photography.

Books I dislike. …I don’t know..

So what do you do when you have a partner who goes out and  buys books from charity shops every week! ..? You send him back with ones to donate.  I have wondered if I should take some to a local second hand book shop but I dont know if they would take them.

I read books at bedtime to help me sleep. Some of the physics ones can send me off in minutes. At the moment I’m reading the Earthsea Quartet by Ursula LeGuin and 1356 by Bernard Cornwell. I have a copy of The Handmaids Tale I bought in the 1980’s by Margaret Atwood, and also The Colour Purple by Alice Walker. One book Richard introduced me to was A Canticle for Leibovitz which is a post apocalyptic story.  It’s very strange.

So yes I love these books, I would never get a kindle or e-book reader. There is something about turning paper pages, without having to charge the battery up just when you are mid chapter, also if you drop a book when you fall asleep it doesn’t break the screen, and yes I have read books in the bath… they can get very soggy!

 

Bored?

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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

Writing….

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Late last night I stared to write a little story about this woman I had drawn, it was called Charlis and it was about her rescuing her village from a flood using powers that she did not realise she had. It was not meant to be a superhero / comic type story, I was hoping it would be deeper than that.

I had got about half way through   (it was only short) and was concentrating on the plot when my tablet ran out of battery power and closed on me. This morning the story has gone.

I find it difficult to write stories, to put myself in other people’s lives. Doing something like this is quite daunting, would it be too verbose?  too convoluted? did it make sense, could I take people with me into the story?

I can’t remember half of what I had written, and I don’t want to inflict something on you that might not be any good.

So what should I do, recreate it, is it worth the hassle?  I tend to write things spontaneously, without any planning.  Late night writing when you are tired is not the best way of going about things. I don’t think I’m much of a writer, I don’t feel my words flow, I am just learning. At least I have age and some experience to fall back on.

I will ponder on this. …

 

Bump in the night

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Ever since I was burgled years ago I have been very sensitive to hearing sounds at night, especially when they should not be there.  Hearing car doors open, or little thudding noises attract me towards the front door!

The neighbour bangs his windows shut late at night and that makes me jump, then the cats race round chasing each other, like a herd of elephants up and down the stairs….

But its the little subtle noises outside that get me, not the noise of someone using our wheelie bin to put their empty beer can in….but the creaks and groans from the tree branches near the house, quiet footsteps passing the front door. Then a sudden screech of brakes as a car comes down the hill too fast.

We have whistling windows so when its windy you can hear the whoosh of air hitting the house, I actually quite like that. Occasionally there is the sound of cats fighting, or the strange squeal of foxes. All this in an urban area.

Sometimes I go outside with a torch,  I imagine I am scary enough to frighten an intruder off…. the only thing that happens then is I end up walking on slugs or snails as the garden is quite overgrown……

What noises are right and what are wrong?  The gate opening is wrong, rattling noises by the side window, the metallic clunk of the gate bolt moving…..milk bottles by the gate rattling are all wrong…,what’s right? Birdsong late at night, don’t hear it as much at this time of year. Friendly voices of people passing on their way home, not the rowdy shouting we sometimes hear.

I realise there is a lot more going on out there than I thought. Better than tinnitus though!

Night all x

“That spiky things flowering…”

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Conversation:

‘What thing?’

“That thing on the corner”

‘What thing on the corner!  Where abouts?’

“On the corner , you know…”

‘What’s that?’

“The spiky thing”

‘On the corner?”

“By the willow”

‘What willow?’

“On the corner”

‘Oh hell…..what are you going on about?!’

“You know”

‘But I don’t, that’s why I’m asking’

“Its spiky, got yellow and orange berries”

‘Pyrocantha!?’

“Yes!”

Silence. ………

‘What are you doing? ‘

Noises in the kitchen……..

‘Hello? Whats happening?’

“Just mending my steam engine!”

😠 ‘argh!’

Is it like this in your house? It is in mine.

Design

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With cuts in education it appears that arts subjects are getting lower take up’s these days.

Students have to do more “useful” subjects, like Maths, English and Sciences, plus probably a language. Then if they go on to college or university the temptation is to go for more academic courses, especially when a 3 year course is going to cost upward of 30 or 40 thousand pounds.

I went to a Polytechnic, many years ago now. I got a maintenance grant and didn’t have to get a loan (they didn’t exist then). The costs were paid for by taxation, which was higher in the past. This made sense because that money raised by the exchequer sustained the education system as well as other services such as the NHS.

Things gradually changed, governments changed, their ideas changed and the rules changed. Where once there were grants now there are loans, where once there were bursaries, now there are loans. You may not have to pay them back until you are over an earnings threshold. But student loans are at 6% interest per annum, when inflation is between 2% or 3%. In other words the loans are a form of future taxation. Only low level, but over the years it takes to get a good job that persons debt is due to spiral. Is it any wonder that Art subjects are being dropped….

But Art is important, if you look at the patterns on these dresses, the design of the dresses, even the frill on the lamp shade? Someone designed that….

Artists may not get paid much but they make the world more beautiful and interesting. Artists can be innovators…look at the art of Leonardo da Vinci, he not only drew and painted, but came up with designs for tanks and helicopters and planes. They were not built because the technology did not exist to make them, but the ideas were there.

Art and design can be done on computers nowadays, press a button?  No you still have to have someone to draw out the designs. Without art the world would be a boring, grey, sad place.

So if you feel like doing art….do it!