Joyously Jolly June
Crushed creativity — only temporarily though — oh, yes!
The gardens in the area are overflowing with flowers now. PupperJack and I appreciate them as we amble around the place, stocking up on their positive energy.
Orchid rockrose above provides many shocking pink highlights on our trips around the neighbourhood.
Love-in-the mist (above left) in three different colours — I think I’ve only seen the blue before. Pink roses — lovely. So many roses everywhere. Fabulous. Some of them fragrant — especially the white ones.
We’re very lucky to have a lot of green spaces in this city (Bristol, South West England). This park is one of them. PupperJack and I stare at it from across the road. That’s as close as we’ll get to it knowing full well that if we ventured in there would be loose dogs and all kinds of hassle. It’s not worth it.
If we feel energetic we walk all the way around it on the outside of it, but we don’t go in.
There’s this fabulous hedge of shrubby germander on one of our walks . It has a sweet, lemony scent and is always buzzing with bees, so although we appreciate it, we try not to brush up against it.
I like that I live in a neighbourhood where, if you have spare plants after a gardening session, or you’ve grown more than you need, people tend to put them in bags and put them on their garden wall for anyone to take if they want them.
Ooh — and a fridge-freezer if required, too — one complete with blackboard doors for aspiring writers/artists.
In fact, all kinds of things show up on the front wall of people’s gardens if they no longer want them, but someone passing might.
Black Lace elderberry (above left) is a new shrub that’s appeared in the last couple of years around here. And also these thistles — red when I was expecting purple!
Red hot pokers (above left), a PupperJack in the undergrowth, and fragrant jasmine. Lovely!
I fished out an old pic of Kitty in her best Derby hat. I have so many old paintings in my computer — I really need to spend the time methodically going through my files to find them all and do something useful with them. As it is, I tend to go through them when I’m having difficulty getting going again. (see next para)
Whenever Real Life comes along and gets all Real Lifeish the things that go first and come back last are the creative things — writing, painting, learning piano, learning French, etc.
This is what happens to me. It’s obviously not the same for everyone. I was asked what I did, though, when this happens …
I’m trying to get the painting back at the moment and it’s really hard work, but I know from past experience that it has to be forced — it’s no use waiting for when it’s ready. It’s no use waiting for ‘inspiration to strike’. (Not for me.)
The painting above has been on my drawing board for a couple of weeks already. I make myself add something to it every day, no matter how small.
I know the day will come (soon) when, suddenly, it won’t need to be forced anymore and I’ll start to paint most days again as if I’d never stopped. I just have to get through this phase first.
Dennett started the Photo-a-Day Challenge to help combat the pandemic blues.
Since then many others kindly share their week with us:
Erika Burkhalter, Anne Bonfert, Tracy Aston, Lisa Bolin, Juan O. Aguilera, David Wade Chambers, June Nguyen, Mia Verita, LensAfield, Barbara Radisavljevic, Diana Lotti, Barb Dalton, Kim Zuch, K. Barrett, Penny Grubb, Ellie Jacobson, Shruthi Sundaram, Jillian Amatt — Artistic Voyages, Vidya Sury, Collecting Smiles
(If your name should, or should not, be on this list, please let me know.)
Susan’s Amazon Page / Susan’s Etsy Store/ newsletter sign-up
Read more from me: © Susan Alison 2022