Season transitioning

This past weekend was a case in point.
Saturday morning there was a heavy frost and ice in the birdbath. Icy cold wind and precipitation threatening most of the day.
It did fall during the night.
Sunday was a glorious sunny warm day! We drove to the coast through a gorgeous sunny landscape with such visibility that we saw the Cheviot on the way there covered in SNOW! And then saw the blue blue sea with the Cheviot at our backs. Very rare such extreme visibility.
The trip across country and the small towns like Rothbury and Alnwick was truly fun.I was singing most of the trip, my inane made-up on the spot songs...poor driver!
We got to Seahouses on the coast and could see Bamburgh castle over the golden dunes, Lindisfarne and the Farne islands as well. Quite amazing.
Just a couple of hours from our valley.
Snow and sun.
We took a lovely walk through the wee fishing village and onto the pier.
Then we visited friends who were having a house warming on the most perfect of days.
Met a crime writer, a poet and some other literary folk!
The feast was impressive and our hosts are lovely people. My favourite couple in the area in fact.
Drove home via Scotland and Yeavering Bell of the famous cup and ring marks.
Coming home I felt sure that SPRING had indeed arrived.
Planted white geraniums in cobalt blue pots to celebrate.

Maps

I have always been fascinated by maps.
When I was a young child I would pour over the atlas at home and the globe at school.
I spent hours traveling over the maps.
I read maps quite well and was especially good at orienteering in school. I loved it!
My hallway in Cambridge was plastered with maps from all over the world. Places I had been, places where friends lived and places I wanted to visit!
I would look at them frequently going into reverie. I had a pew in the hall and I could sit there for hours. Daydreaming is one of my pleasures. "My one weakness!" as Dorcas would say.
The underground maps below interest me particularly because they have become so schematic as representations. They are challenging especially for any traveler who does not know the lay of the land as it were.
In fact they are usually totally incorrect from an overground point of view.
Still they are so beautiful to look at. I find I prefer the red train and I like to travel on that one. When I lived in London it was my train, the Central Line, and in Boston the Red Line.
Newcastle does not have one, they have a minimal two colour system.
And New York, well what can I say?!

Maps of the Underground

Boston Anagram T map
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London Underground map

NYC Subway map

Newcastle upon Tyne Metro map

Stockholm my hometown

The underground map called Tunnelbana in Swedish

I wonder about that hometown business. I was born there and yes I grew up for several years there. But hometown?
What qualifies a hometown, a place you come from? Where you were born or grew up or simply a place you feel at home?
I prefer the last option. By far.
In that case I would have had several hometown relationships over the years.
Berne in Switzerland was a place I loved and visited for many many years. Swimming in the Aare, walking in the old town and along the river, sitting in the sun on the Munster terrasse, eating Paella at Commerce, cheese fondue at Harmonie, seeing friends, going to the museums, the tierpark, but most importantly Elka, the woman I visited.
Cambridge, Mass. was a hometown for several years also.
Provincetown an instant love affair which continues.
NYC, in particular Manhattan, in the late seventies when I fell in love with it.
I do like LA but not like a hometown, London...complicated..., Newcastle...no way!
Bergen I adored!
Bomarzo was a hometown for as long as I lived there and it has a very special place in my heart.
There are other places and traces of living but I think I have covered the main suspects.
Stockholm was a formative place to grow up in.

Another octogenarian to celebrate - Cecil Taylor

Poet and Pianist

This remarkable photo was taken in the 60's. I love the feline!

Guernica

Heard on the news that a tapestry of Guernica is coming to London to be on show. I hope I get to see it.
When I was young girl I saw Guernica and it made the deepest impression on me. In fact the work inhabited my nightmares and daymares for years and years.
We lived in Spain for a while and it seeped into my being. The light, the scents, the flavours, the warmth and dry air on my skin, the kindness of people to kids, the language and the colours which were so vivid to me. I enjoyed the time spent there immensely. I had a freedom I had not had before. Free to roam and make friends and explore on my own. I used to go to the cloisters and spend time in the gardens helping out.
I learned how to swim there, but I also had a a near drowning experience which still makes me unhappy about having water over my head although I LOVE swimming.
The Gaudi architecture seemed to be designed just for the pleasure of us young folk.
I was very happy there and yet the nightmares that haunted me for years in my youth were also acquired there. Guernica for one and going to a bull fight the other. It was the most traumatic experience of my life for a long while. I was identifying with the bull and screamed when he died, thick blood pouring out of his mouth. This image was impossible to eradicate.
This living in Spain was very much about life and death and the intensity of living with those dualities.
I feel grateful to my parents for brining us there to live.

Condolences and empathy

This is my favourite photo of the family it looks like a painting!

As I heard the very sad news of Nicholas Hughes' death in Alaska yesterday my heart goes out to those who loved and knew him.
Depression is very difficult to live with and is often "invisible" from the outside.
My sympathy goes out to all sufferers and I wish that the support and understanding was more acute and present for those with depression.
Be kind to yourself, breathe and self-care. Every day is another new day.