Celebrating gardens, photography and a creative life
This vignette in Fairhope, Alabama, made me smile. While the words on the artwork may seem naive or optimistic in our fractured times, I read this as a reminder to find pleasure in life if we can. Continue reading “Do What Makes You Happy”
“You live a normal life and it’s quite difficult to realise that this normal life is coming to an end.”
– Man in Ukraine, BBC interview, 24th February 2022
In normal times, a permanent collection of Barbara Hepworth’s work can be seen in the St Ives garden she so evidently loved. Although the garden remains on shutdown, a wide range of material is available online (see the links below). Her work fits wonderfully well into its Cornish setting, within striking distance of ancient standing stones such as Mên-an-Tol, Lanyon Quoit and the Kenidjack Common Holed Stones. Continue reading “Nine Barbara Hepworth Quotes (With Pictures)”
The International Day of Happiness is on Friday 20th March in 2020 – happiness has never seemed so important or elusive.
I’m sharing sixteen more of my favourite happiness quotes as a gesture of solidarity. Every little helps as we try to reach out as cheerfully as we can to others, in a world where society is hunkering down.
Please join in and commemorate the day if you can. Continue reading “Sixteen Snippets Of Happiness In Trying Times”
At one time, I kept a Roman Emperor’s ‘Meditations’ on the corner of my desk at work so I had ready access to a consoling or restraining line from a wise and gentle counsellor. Flicking through the pages at random for a minute or two could always give me the boost I needed.
Marcus Aurelius ruled in a time of currency devaluation, war, flooding, starvation, infectious diseases, plots and coup attempts. His wife gave birth to at least 13 children. Only five were alive when he died. His words are directed to himself: we overhear them and can interpret them as we choose. I have always liked the idea that he lived at the extreme end of a bell curve – he understood glory, sadness, responsibility, politics and power and held on to his humanity under pressure that dwarfs anything I hope to understand or experience. Here are some of my favourite Marcus Aurelius quotes:
1. You will not easily find a man coming to grief through indifference to the working of another’s soul; but for those who pay no heed to the motions of their own, unhappiness is their sure reward.
2. Dig within. There lies the well-spring of good: ever dig, and it will ever flow.
3. Your mind will be like its habitual thoughts; for the soul becomes dyed with the colour of its thoughts.
4. Today I have got myself out of all my perplexities; or rather, I have got my perplexities out of myself, for they were not without, but within; they lay in my own outlook. Continue reading “20 Quotes from Meditations by Marcus Aurelius”
Transformed into a silhouette, its beak open, the bird on the edge of the Grand Canyon seems more symbol than living creature: something we’ll each interpret under influences as consistent as temperament and experience or as fleeting as a mood. Long time followers may recognise a similar, more uplifting shot, taken nearby.
Coming across the picture and the short poem, Requiem by Kurt Vonnegut, in quick succession, it seemed fitting to put them together here, today. Continue reading “The Last Living Thing”
“Spring always seeming to one as if the flowers had been hiding, and only came out into the sun because they were afraid that grown-up people would grow tired of looking for them and give up the search…”
Oscar Wilde – De Profundis
Susan Rushton 