Shopping in style

It bothers me sometimes that our supermarkets and shops do not look like this any more. I can more than imagine the smells that emanated from this establishment - tea in proper tea chests, tins of powdered Colman's mustard, loose biscuits and slabs of ham squatting on cold marble.
And when exactly did our shopkeepers stop wearing sheets?


Did it become so terribly old fashioned to hang dead bodies in the street?Meat waving about in the wind is surely more healthy that being double wrapped in plastic?


When did we stop giving our shops interesting names and was it so politically incorrect to have men's and women's outfitters?


Even the sellers of boots for public benefit wore sheets and hung their lighting with style.



When did we stop being able to buy a quarter of sherbert oranges from a glass sweet jar and ten Player's (Only Player's please so much!) at the same time?



And even petrol was served from interesting looking gizmo's (these are local pumps and are about to be restored).


Memories please.....

Yes, but who the fuck is driving?

Bugger.
This is book number six and why has no one thought to tell me the rules? I am once again flying by the seat of me drawers (stops for a minute to examine very stupid last statement and carries on regardless) and have been taken over by the mysterious hands which obviously don't belong to me.
I suppose it is not cool to admit that one is taken over by unseen forces but the fact of the matter is that my ghostly writer often writes crap and I have to start all over again. The hands are also not terribly good at spelling, much less editing anything as we (we?) go along but I have been wondering if I could pop off on holiday and leave them to it.

I have romantic thoughts that my 'ghost writer' might be Daphne. My solid reasoning tells me that Ms Du Maurier only lived a few miles away, she's dead, and she probably misses writing. Unfortunately my solid reasoning also informs me that I have not ever, to my knowledge cobbled together a sentence like "Last night I dreamt I went to Manderley again". I may have touched on "Last night I went down the chip shop" or possibly "Last night I dreamt of chocolate again" so maybe Daffers is resting in peace and has no interest in how my next chapter is going to shape up.

The fact is that my writing is increasingly becoming an out of body experience. Somewhere along the line I have got the engineers in and made a bypass around the headland. I should be embracing this thing but it scares me sometimes; traffic moves at an incredible speed and only just misses the road works and blocks. Without the head police in control I turn into a boy racer with a hatchback and an ear bursting stereo. It also bothers me that I never know where the current writing road is going much less who the fuck is driving.

Oh well, the next signpost says Chapter 13 - unlucky for some. Suppose I'll go and make some tea and wait until it's finished.

.

The yeah, yeah sisterhood

At 4pm the days work will be done. The house cleaned, shopping stashed and all the other ghastly Saturday jobs will have been accomplished for another week. At 4pm this Saturday the door knocker will announce the beginning of another Gin Club meeting. The girls are coming!

Me girls. We have seen each other through births and deaths, fatness and thinness, beginnings, ends and all the mucky bits in between. For nearly thirty years these exceptional women have held my head above water on many occasions. Lending their love and support through the horror of my parents quick deaths and the nights when my children refused to do what the book said.

Our Saturday afternoon Gin Co-operative evolved from our men deserting us in favour of some windswept pitch and a pair of disgustingly muddy football boots. We whiled away the hours adding gin to a pot of tea until we had solved the problems of the week.
They are friends who listen as much as they talk, never judge or disapprove and have an uncanny ability to turn up when I need them most. They are my unpaid therapists, my miserable bitches, my lovely, lovely girls. I am lucky to have friends like this.
I wonder what the nursing home will make of us?


"And when there is mischief in the world, will you turn your back and tut disapprovingly, or will you pour and gin and put the world to rights with the best women in the universe."

.

Weight

A weighty weight
of polished sand,
sits upon
my thoughtful hand.
The light refracts,
slips and slides
distorting bubbles
deep inside.
No fairy liquid,
or snowfall shakes,
just a coloured sphere
that paper waits.

.

There is this book.....

....that is begging to be written.

So I am.

And I will.

For a while.

Hepworth

Having a friend to stay from out of town often means a lovely excuse to dip into local culture. Apart from showing Linda every sheep on the southern peninsula we also found time to have lunch in St Ives and wander around the Barbara Hepworth Sculpture Garden.


It's not often that I rave about sculpture, or any art for that matter, but this is something special and every time I visit the garden there is always something new to see, some new angle to discover.
Barbara Hepworth was unique. A close friend of Picasso, Henry Moore and married to the artist Ben Nicholson, Hepworth became part of the close knit St Ives set producing some of her finest work.


Trewyn Studio was both home and studio. The large garden became a canvas for her work, showing the natural form and fluidity that reflects the 'pagan' coast that surrounded her home.



The installations in the garden change with light and season.Barbara died in 1975 but her amazing art goes on and is a delight. It is well worth a visit if you are down this way.