What’s keeping you sane these days? For me, it’s the simple satisfaction of completion: the lists crossed off, the last piece put in place. In this time of limited distraction and distance I’ve found that seeing things finished is very good for my self. In fact, I just read this week that completing a task… Continue reading Diversions
Category: Oh My Soul
A Story and a Legend
Every story has its ending sometime. In our estate, one lovely story ended this week with the passing of our amazing neighbour, Mrs. Lynch. My part of that story started just after we were married. I decided to host a coffee morning for the Irish Hospice Foundation, an annual happening in Ireland. Although I did… Continue reading A Story and a Legend
What To Do When There’s Nothing To Do
It’s easy these days to think about all those things we can’t do at the moment, especially now that Ireland has stepped back again into stricter guidelines. I could list all those things I’m missing — sometimes it is good to stop and mourn — but I think it’s also helpful to relish what I… Continue reading What To Do When There’s Nothing To Do
Seasonal Change
Things are blooming much later in Ireland this year after our everlasting winter, so my joy was even greater when my mock orange blossomed before I left my back garden for the summer. The fragrance and the slightly bobbing white blooms remind me of the times I spent on a blanket underneath, with my babies… Continue reading Seasonal Change
Into the Empty Spaces
To be honest, I’ve thought about this year long before now, like most of us have, I imagine. Last new year’s eve, we opened our home and celebrated with friends, then started the new year with our annual tradition of a walk with good friends, followed by food and drink. For 2016, we went to… Continue reading Into the Empty Spaces
Building a Garden, Creating a Space
Prompted from several different sources, I’ve recently been ruminating over spaces: the ones we inhabit, the ones we create around us. Sacred spaces, holy places where we breathe and create and reflect, like Eden, a sacred space for friendship and walking in the cool of the evening. And liminal spaces, thresholds, where we may pause, where… Continue reading Building a Garden, Creating a Space
Without the lonely
Writing can be lonely, but being a writer doesn’t have to be. — Dave Rudden, author of Knights of the Borrowed Dark. It can be a tough job, slogging away on your own, with only your page in front of you, wondering if this is actually going anywhere, never mind in the right direction. But writing… Continue reading Without the lonely
On Writing
Sometimes I feel like I have a love-hate relationship with writing. Other creative pursuits satisfy me deeply — indeed, I don’t get very far into a week or even a day before something creative needs to happen — but none are the drive in me that writing is. And yet. It is such hard work,… Continue reading On Writing
The Nourishing, the Nurturing
The artist that I live with came home one night after a concert (that he almost didn’t bother going to) saying it was lovely, the “kind of thing, you know, that feeds your own art.” I’ve been thinking lately about being nourished and flourishing, some of the thoughts sparked by a text one day. I… Continue reading The Nourishing, the Nurturing
The Nourishing
A text from someone who loves me said, “I hope you’re getting to do some of what nourishes you.” I was. I had just had a good root through a couple of charity shops that I don’t get to often. In the end I bought nothing, but there were a couple of things that made me pause: some heavy cut glass… Continue reading The Nourishing
kennedy street 