White Christmas

 A wonderful white Christmas! I caught a virus Christmas shopping and was offline for over a week. What with the snow, camp fever set in and by the 23rd I was painting skirting boards and door frames!

Having voraciously read The Other Queen by Phillippa Gregory - I was swept away by the enigma that was Mary Queen of Scots - and The Help by Kathryn Stockett - paradoxical relationships in 1960s southern states - I am now catching up with Jackson Brodie in Kate Atkinson's 4th genre bending crime novel. The snow has become a regular feature of the landscape now and I will be sad if it melts away tomorrow as predicted. Lots of long, gluteus enhancing walks and today sledging in the Golden Valley. Yesterday I glanced up from my book to check the clock at 4 ish and I swear it is getting noticeably lighter in the evenings. A bit of internet research tells me that this close to the winter solstice it is only by seconds a day but that the rate speeds up as we near the spring equinox due to Earth's elliptical orbit of the sun. However it has been good to emerge from the grey fog, have some bright days and, I still swear, lighter afternoons. We have had some beautiful Blakeian light with pink skies and snows, see my pics, and though not captured on camera I was rewarded on my way to midnight mass on Christmas eve by the sight of a beautiful fox rolling in the snow on the roadside as I drove past totally unfazed by the headlights as I slowed down for a better look!

Christmas Hoo Ha and New Year resolutions

I know already what my New Years resolutions will be - at least two of them anyway. I must chill out more by making more quiet time and doing more active stuff. I hate being cold and sometimes confuse that with being out in the cold which of course does really warm you up. And I hate aching muscles and joints so sometimes forget how much I enjoy the swimming, sailing, cycling, walking that can make me achey and I forget that sitting at the keyboard just makes different bits of me stiff and sore. One thing I haven't done enough of this year is riding out on the bike and the one thing that causes me to pause before a long ride is, well, it's a sensitive subject really. So the product on the right, the aptly named Hoo Ha Ride Glide from my friends at minx-girl.com caught my interest, is on my Christmas list to myself and will hopefully encourage the start of an active New Year! Top of my published list is this fab Iceguard coat from Jack Wolfskin which I happen to know I will get even though it is out of stock everywhere - I can't wait to check it out in the snow! Talking of which it is falling again in big soft clumps so I am hoping for a freeze overnight and a winter wonderland in the morning for the last day of school. Looking forward to relaxing next week, most cards are sent, though I missed the last U.S. posting date again,  the presents that have arrived are wrapped and I hope the rest are in the post, and I am looking forward to cooking, watching movies and playing with grandsons.That's as active and chilled as it gets until after holidays. Happy Christmas everyone!

Winter on the Ridgeway

The respite from the cold lasted barely two days, since when the frost has been bitter and beautiful. I was determined to walk in the daylight and managed to be on the Ridgeway west of Aldbury to capture these pictures as the light faded. As the sun set the utter beauty of the empty landscape shining under the hoar was total. Lights winked on in the distance as I headed home.

lemon curd

I waited all week for a daylight walk in the snow but last night the rains came and it was all but washed away. Today being warmer we did a tidy up in the garden instead and even put in a few last minute bulbs - lots of narcissus to look forward to from February and alliums for later on - I can't wait! The bulbs I planted in October are already peeping through so I'm hoping that a week of minus temperatures has put them on hold rather than finished them off completely.

Putting up 'the lights' was as traumatic as every year and now they are on hold for a few days too. Then I had the good idea of putting an extra layer of insulation in the loft which mysteriously led to a damaged pipe, fused lights and a damp patch on the landing ceiling, so no money saved there. Serves me right for not doing it myself........

So, some cooking for the soul. Lemon curd -  smelling of summer at Christmas, glossy after an hour of stirring, infusing the house (and my hair) with citrus, the shining jars cooling on the kitchen window sill. As I stirred I listened to the fabulous 'I Claudius' on Radio 4.

my lemon curd recipe

put 8oz butter in a preserving pan and melt gently.

add 24 oz caster sugar (I keep a vanilla pod in the jar)

and the zest and juice of 9 lemons.

Stir for ages until the sugar is completely dissolved, then cool until you can leave your finger in it comfortably.

Meanwhile whisk 8 eggs in a bowl and when the mixture is comfortable whisk them in.

Then stir constantly as you raise the temperature. It should still never get too hot for your finger.

As you gradually raise the heat the curd will thicken like custard and when it coats the back of a spoon quite stickily it is ready to ladle into warmed jars.

Pop a wax disc on top and tighten the lid. Store in a cool place and try not to eat all at once!

I always feel a little queasy after lemon curd making as it is hard not to taste it often. Some people strain it but I like to nibble on the zest. This made 4 jars and a little one and it is Yummy!

Snow lambs

 First Sight

Lambs that learn to walk in snow

When their bleating clouds the air

Meet a vast unwelcome, know

Nothing but a sunless glare.

Newly stumbling to and fro

All they find, outside the fold,

Is a wretched width of cold.



As they wait beside the ewe,

Her fleeces wetly caked, there lies

Hidden round them, waiting too,

Earth's immeasureable surprise.

They could not grasp it if they knew,

What so soon will wake and grow

Utterly unlike the snow.

Philip Larkin

Actually not quite as the header suggests - these were the heavy snows we had last early spring, but we've had a sprinkling and trekked up to the Marches again this weekend to enjoy the real thing. Heard this lovely poem on Radio 4 as we drove home, read beautifully by David Walliams - I had to admit surprise. Arrived back in time for Advent carols in our village church, above. So Christmas is early this year! P.S. The snow fell for real on Monday and has stayed crisp and even just a couple of inches deep all week thanks to max temperatures of 0c.

Night out!

Just got in from a good night out at the Rex, our local, beautifully restored cinema. I went for the first time around 1970 and it is much improved now with luxurious seats and lots of gilding. And a bar. Tamara Drewe is the new Bridget Jones and just as funny and endearing. I used to read the Guardian in my mum's kitchen on Saturday mornings and have always followed Posy Simmons so well done her! Actually it was the second time this week. Couldn't face anything heavy and also really enjoyed Made in Dagenham. Quite nostalgic - of course not many of the women looked like that, I have seen the newsreels, but a great little British film. My legs were restless as always but the g&t helped and it was easy to slide back in my seat and relax on a wet mid week evening. We don't go much in the summer but now that the dark evenings have arrived I will be a regular again. So lucky to have a great screen so nearby!

streets of London

Spent the day around Regents Park and Little Venice. In all the years I had never walked west from Regents Park and after a gloomy stretch of canal found the picturesque village around the basin where film stars mingle with boat dwellers. Ate fabulous baked orange cheesecake in a tiny cafe right over the water, followed only hours later by Lebanese supper and is was ok because we walked, walked, walked from noon until after dark. Beautiful Georgian townhouses and in the back streets behind Marylebone every sort of business and building including one amazing fascade supported by scaffolding as the entire rest of the building is rebuilt. I did a bit of research into this incredible piece of engineering/architecture and found that it is part of the old Middlesex Hospital, part of the ill fated Noho Square development with a fascinating story behind it. The Lost Hospitals of London website tells the story... incredibly, even the drainpipes are left in place as the site awaits development.

It was good to be in the noisy, busy city again but even better to come home to the peace and quiet of the country. I 've realised lately that I've been struggling to turn off and learn to be quiet again. Once upon a time I could meditate but now my mind jangles day and night. I am looking for a retreat....

Obama mama

Someone sent me this link and being a fan of the President I didn't know that I would appreciate it.............but I did and I would like to think that he would too!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y54FRMedT_s

I particularly liked the choruses! I did a bit of a Google and am now a Ronnie Butler Jnr fan too. What a talented guy!

last of the British summertime

Today the sun shone and on the last day before we lose an hour of afternoon daylight we did one of my favourite walks. Through the beautiful south facing valley from Aldbury to Duncombe Farm where the last blackberries are still good on the north of the lane ...

beeches all along Duncombe Terrace on the Ashridge boundary are just beginning to turn now, the oaks are still green, the cherries flame....

past Barley End,looking toward the Ridgeway across newly ploughed fields so good you could eat them...

towards Clipperdown ....

and up the steeep chalk path eating one of the very last Coxes scrumped on our way through...

afternoon sunlight filtering through the beech trees as we meet the boundary path

looking toward Wiggington sheep graze beneath a still green oak.

We cut back down through Duncombe Terrace where we were thoroughly investigated by the herd of young black bullocks - Dexters I think and very pretty whatever they are! This is where we watched a fox drinking from the water trough earlier in the year.

best place in the world

Of course I haven't been to very many places but it is nice to think that there is no place like home. Today I found this website of lovely walks in the Chilterns, all beautifully photographed with cunning links to flora and fauna. I am too mean to share my favourite walks in the dread that they become overun with sightseers but I know most of these wonderful walks. It is rare for me to walk 12 miles these days but Pete has helpfully supplied maps and most of the walks can be shortened. As his photographs show the vistas are just perfect. This week Autumn has taken hold and the leaves, having held on longer than usual due to mild temperatures and excessive rainfall, have just begun to turn and fall. I must take my camera out tomorrow.

waterside

Visited the new Waterside theatre in Aylesbury last week. Despite the architect descibing his inspiration as the Chiltern landscape in this video clip, http://www.bucksherald.co.uk/lifestyle/entertainments/theatre/exclusive_waterside_theatre_video_tour_1_1489449  it looks very retro, the outside strongly 1930's (my grandson immediately recognised it as 'Titanic') the inside very festival of Britain, in the nicest possible way. Gorgeous, rich orange paint and seating, '50's meets Goldsworthy' blockwood walls, extravagent pendant lighting and green flecked carpets make it an epilectic's nightmare, so plenty to excite my ADH tendencies. Performance of Evita was wonderful and enhanced by the lighting and stage design which gave the whole thing a cinematic feel. We had a fabulous view from the first circle, but annoyingly little leg room! Going back soon for a grandma's treat to see Joseph.

best beaches

This header is a not very good shot of Hayling Island from West Wittering beach. When we visited a week ago the rain only stopped for a few hours and visibility was rubbish but inclement weather notwithstanding it would never make it into my top ten. A quick google had brought it up and it looked within good striking distance. The salt lagoon on the leeward side of the headland is a bonus but the beach is pretty ordinary. For the same distance I would make for Highcliffe or Hengistbury Head and for a bit more effort and a weekend away, Manorbier and Barafundle Bay are among the best these isles have to offer. We spent an idyllic weekend at Hurst House near Laugharne in the summer and I am pining to return. Just a niggling worry that without the balmy summer weather and the swallows dipping in under the eaves it would be reduced and I do hate to be disappointed.......

ISIS

Another picture from the banks of the Thames, now Isis, at Lechlade. The swans were everywhere, grazing in the fields, preening in the shallows, like the children of Lir, one of my favourite stories: 

Long ago in ancient Ireland lived a great chieftain Lir and his four children: Fionnuala, Aodh, Fiachra and Conn. His wife, Eva had died in childbirth but the children lived happily with their father in his castle in the middle of a forest. Near to the castle was a lake where the children swam daily. They were great swimmers as Lir was also king over the ocean and they were possessed of gills. After some years Lir married Eva's sister Aoife who became insanely jealous of the children and plotted to kill them. One perfect summer's day Aoife appeared on the lakeside and from her cloak drew a magic wand. A fireball hit the water and the children were transformed into beautiful swans, their feathers as white as snow, the only remnant of their past to remain was their beautiful singing voices. For nine hundred years the children were destined to haunt Lough Derravaragh, the Sea of Moyle and the waters of Inish Glora until the spell was broken by the toll of a church bell.  

The legend was used by writers, artists and poets over generations as an allegory for the state of the nation under British rule. There are many beautiful representations inspired by the legend which belongs to a fascinating genre of 'shape shifting stories' found across the globe. 

clear blue Sunday

We headed west again this weekend and missed the dreary weather back home. Sunday found us climbing The Whimble, a steep hill topped with an ancient round barrow, in the heart of the Radnor Forest. Surprisingly not very wooded, quite steep and 360 degree views deep into mid Wales. The sun shone almost fiercely, the sky was blue and those two specks in the pic are buzzards circling. We met no one until we were well on our way back down and the only sounds were of those buzzards, grouse and crows - a cathartic day's walking, with quite a bit of eating to follow. In the evening met up with friends from way back and time stood still. Recommended.

windfalls

Walked from Aldbury through Clipperdown and on the Ridgeway across Pitstone Hill last night and tasted the best apples since I was a kid - windfalls: huge, red, juicy and sweet-sour. I thought I was just getting old and jaded but now I am convinced that the world around me has changed. Before biting into them the scent hit me and I was back in the orchards of my youth. The blackberries were good too. It was blowing a gale on Pitstone Hill earlier in the week but last night was sunny and calm with the first hint of Autumn in the air. Today, back to the Thames with only 28 miles to go and made it to Kelmscott in time for a cream tea. We are filling in a gap we left in the route before the last stretch beyond Lechlade and aim to finish before the nights draw in. The milky river meanders on between water meadows filled with grazing swans (and cows), and our magic moment was when we almost stepped upon a hare, which then shot off across the field, one ear still bent from sleep, leaving a flattened crescent in the grass warm to touch.

kelmscott

How ever many years it took us to walk the Ridgeway, so with the Thames path - every year we say we will finish it, but still it wends on. When the days begin to lengthen at the start of the summer we make our resolutions, in September as the evenings draw in we renew them with vigour - too late!

Kelmscott, the Thameside home of William Morris was our Autumn treat. With limited summer open days I had been intending to visit for the past thirty years and never had. The internet is a great tool! We have walked almost to Lechlade and with only two open days before the  house closes for the winter we made it. The sun shone on the pretty gardens still laid out as the great man decreed. Apples hung heavy on the trees and we ate outside the great barn as lazy wasps sucked on windfalls  and we sucked on local ale. Extremely pleasant. Inside all was much as when the great man was there - his daughter May lived there until the 1930's and allowed no changes to be made before leaving it in her will to Oxford University. Her hand embroidered hangings still decorate her father's bed and his own weaving hangs in the hall near the unfaded preparatory drawings. All is very peaceful, a rural idyll. We will go again.....

lost for words

Where has tedsmum been all summer? after a year of psychotherapy she found herself lost for words........

my favourite image from a summer of ups and downs is this one of me - crying with laughter. a very good day, we walked barefoot across the sands of Rhossili to Llangennith and back along the grassy footpath at the foot of the beacon. soft earth between my toes, the glittering bay, a warm wind in my hair: whatever were we laughing at? it escapes me now ....

Time for a new header - near Lechlade in the far reaches of the Thames, milky green and lazy , trailing through water meadows of fat cows, framed by an abundance of gorgeous, pink friars balsam. The last days of summer.

back on track

Almost a year after completing the Ridgeway and a few weeks before midsummer we were back. Last time we were tired from the final push and didn't have long enough to explore so with visiting friends to entertain over the bank holiday which should have been Whitsun, the time was right. (Am I the only one irritated by the fact that Mayday is not on Mayday anymore and that Whit weekend is postponed almost into June?) Anyway May blossom and cow parsley lay thickly on the field margins and the air, the beech leaves were at their greenest and the chalk paths beckoned. We arrived early and Colette got some great shots of the stones before we followed the 5,000 year old avenue towards Silbury hill, at an awesome 130 feet the tallest prehistoric constructed mound in Europe. We spent the rest of the day walking to the long barrow at West Kennet, the Sanctuary and on the Ridgeway circling back down to Avebury - amazing views and vibes.

Inspired to be back on track our next outing was on the Thames Path from Eynsham to Moreton. We have now walked / cycled from the Thames barrier to this area north of Oxford and decided to take the bikes again. Maybe a mistake... It was quite hard going through wet water meadows and along narrow, nettled paths in the occasional heavy downpour but a couple of very pretty pubs helped raise our spirits. On the path we passed only a couple of people all afternoon and the fields were pastorally full of buttercups and fat lambs. The Thames is still wide but shallower and slower and looking very swimmable. Dark, snaking reflections, glittering leaves and lush greenery: salves to the soul.

Finally I got myself back on the lake! I haven't taken out a boat since last November, cowed by the memories of bruised shins, grazed knees and chilled bones but as the high pressure came in and school was out I finally made it. The breeze was light so I took out a laser with a full sail and skimmed lazily back and forth among hundreds of electric blue damsel flies with paper white terns dipping in alongside. Magic, even with the achey legs next day.

The Eye of the Beholder

Some things just look right. The formulae for perfection can be explained by mathematical geniuses like Fibonacci and DaVinci but that doesn't quite explain why the eye finds one arrangement more pleasing than another. Familiarity and culture play their part but is it the chicken or the egg? William Morris's willow bough pattern is one of the most popular designs of the 20th century but when I lie under a great crack willow watching the pattern of leaf against sky is it my knowledge of the print that makes it so especially perfect or vice versa? Held in a  pocket of my mind is that other accumulated knowledge, of the ancient medicine, and that perfect sound of wood on willow. On my friend's table: a Spanish plate, seven green pears, William Morris's willow bough print: perfect.

Danced last night to big band sounds under the spetacular roof of Chatham dockyard's number 3 slip. One of Britain’s architectural gems, when built in 1838 this immense covered slip was Europe’s largest wide span timber structure. Reminiscent of an Escher or Leonardo drawing, distressed over a century of labour, as awe inspiring as any cathedral nave it puts Kings Cross in the shade. Visit this summer to see the newly restored Shipbuilding on the Clyde series of paintings by Stanley Spencer. Too big for regular display at the Imperial War Museum this will be a rare outing and an incomparable setting. Chatham Dockyard is an industrial monument on a huge scale not to be missed and this exhibition will be the icing on the cake! 

Golden Bells

Long, long ago when I was optimistic and full of love I lounged on a battered old sofa with my feet in the lap of the man I loved. In the evenings while children slept, we turned up the fire and read poetry to one another and dreamed of long lives entwined and shores we would walk together. One peaceful night in my daughter's first year I found this poem and reading it to my fifty year old love, welled up. The following year he was gone. Years had passed when walking by the Thames a pot of these beautiful little daffodils caught my eye - Narcissus Golden Bells - and I remembered the poem. Now they flower in early May in an old salt glaze pot by my gate.

Golden Bells

When I was almost forty

I had a daughter whose name was Golden Bells.

Now it is just a year since she was born;

She is learning to sit and cannot yet talk.

Ashamed—to find that I have not a sage’s heart:

I cannot resist vulgar thoughts and feelings.

Henceforward I am tied to things outside myself:

My only reward—the pleasure I am getting now.

If I am spared the grief of her dying young,
Then I shall have the trouble of getting her married.
My plan for retiring and going back to the hills

Must now be postponed for fifteen years!



The poem is as moving twelve hundred years after it was written. A few weeks later I found a second poem and the tears streamed down my face.

Remembering Golden Bells


Ruined and ill—a man of two score;

Pretty and guileless—a girl of three.

Not a boy—but still better than nothing:

To soothe one’s feeling—from time to time a kiss!

There came a day—they suddenly took her from me;

Her soul’s shadow wandered I know not where.

And when I remember how just at the time she died

She lisped strange sounds, beginning to learn to talk,

Then I know that the ties of flesh and blood

Only bind us to a load of grief and sorrow.
 At last, by thinking of the time before she was born,

By thought and reason I drove the pain away.

Since my heart forgot her, many days have passed

And three times winter has changed to spring.

This morning, for a little, the old grief came back,
Because, in the road, I met her foster-nurse.

 Po Chu i,  translated by Arthur Waley

Little foxes

Lots of foxy activity these light summer evenings. Walking through the particularly beautiful valley below Clipperdown and Duncombe terrace last week a dapper young dog fox unconcernedly crossed our path and proceeded down to drink at the cattle trough in our full view but rather too distant for a good photo. A little further on a couple of horses were kicking off in the meadow and lo and behold it was another fox that had spooked them. A few summers past I watched the rendezvous of a menage a trois reynards over the field for several weeks before the vixen retired, reappearing several weeks later with three small cubs. This morning they were back in the same spot, though possibly not the same foxes. I have had the great pleasure of watching one laid back vixen sitting in the bracken watching her cubs play in the afternoon sunshine and, late one night, of stopping the car as three cubs rolled off the verge into the lane where they continued to play in the full glare of the headlights until their mother sharply called them home. In my garden are buried both a fox and a badger cub, I was too tender hearted to leave them dead on the roadside: how anyone can kill these beautiful creatures is beyond me.

Peace and Quiet

I know this may offend and you can call me crass. We live under the flight path for Luton airport but that has never bothered me, by the time they pass over us the planes are usually high enough to ignore. I like watching them trek across the summer blue sky leaving chalky vapour trails or seeing headlights piercing thunder dark clouds on a rainy night. Occasionally one will drown out the radio in the garden or the tv as it lulls me to sleep and sometimes early on summer evenings when they stack up to land at Heathrow or pile out of Luton at five minute intervals I am mildly irritated, but just as often I am mesmerised by the steady stream of lights rising from the horizon and many is the time I have calmed a fractious grandson watching them from the gate. So it has been quite a surprise to find that without them our small world is a much more peaceful place. Almost eerily quiet without the background noise it now feels as if we really live in the country. There is less of the associated road traffic too and we began to ponder on if this went on long enough would it change people's attitudes to easy air travel?Then I found this neat graphic from the Information is Beautiful website and it's pretty powerful. I really am sorry if you are stuck somewhere instead of at a funeral or in surgery but otherwise sit back, chill out and listen to the quiet. Shhhh...

Castles in the Air

Great weather, especially for Wales. Too often we see castle views through light drizzle with the wind whipping at our hair but the past few days have been idyllic. Up on the Welsh Marches again it is easy to imagine the battles and skirmishes that took place here. First to Croft Castle, now just a Gothic manor house though the Crofts owned the original medieval castle near this site and fought at nearby Wigmore during the War of the Roses and in the English Civil War at Mortimer's Cross. All was peaceful in the walled garden as the first swallows swooped into the old barns and house martins clung to the stones of the main house sunbathing beneath their mud nests. I have not seen them yet at home but here the first lone swallow arrived in March.

On to Clun and my favourite little castle set on a bend of the river overlooking tranquil water meadows. Unfortunately the scaffolding has been up for well over a year now but still a perfect picnic spot. Locals told us that otters have become regular night time visitors so must go next after dark!

Lastly we visited Montgomery Castle which for thirty years I have managed to miss, but what a treat! I have used it for my header. Built into the rock high above the pretty little market town, it was an impregnable fortress occupied by Celts, Romans and Normans and finally demolished by Parliamentarians during the Civil War. The impressive ruin offers dramatic panoramic views and still awesome remains. Below the small town with its town hall, hardware store, little museum and teashops is quietly purposeful and not dissimilar to the high streets of neighbouring Presteigne or Bishops Castle. Saturday afternoon in Mid Wales is so.... comfortingly familiar. I can't wait to return.

Easter treats

Just back from a few days on the south coast near Lymington. Exhausted ourselves on the first day riding from New Milton through Keyhaven to Lymington on a fabulous cycle path across the marshes.

(Should have worn the minx-girl padded knickers - yes, I'm afraid they really are called that!) Anyway, apart from the bumps it is a terrific ride with the Solent glittering under a wide sky on one side and the salt marsh all sparse grass and peaty pools on the other.

 I failed to capture on camera the red brown water reflecting the cobalt sky or the exotic Little Egret (now breeding happily in these parts despite the cold winter) but can still smell the first gorse flowers of the year mingled with the salt sea air. Sadly the header was my best pic but also spotted Redshank and curlew and the first sprouts of samphire piercing the saltwater ponds once used in salt production hereabouts. Back home today I used the really helpful RSPB bird identifier to check out those waders, then spotted my first Peacock butterfly of the year in the garden. Hope it doesn't get eaten!

Die happy

Easter Sunday. Sang in church and shared peace with friends and neighbours. Walked and talked and ate and drank with dear old friends and got tipsy in the afternoon on gin and painkillers and reminisced and got teary and hugged and laughed out loud and walked and walked. Light evenings: thankyou thankyou God. And sold some stuff I am too fat for on ebay and bought a raised garden bed online and will now dream of beetroot and chard and however will I keep the chickens off it? And listened to my gorgeous grandson's fiveyear old voice describing a bike ride along the seafront and if I die tonight I will be very happy and I haven't said that for a long, long time.......

Only in America?

Most reviews for I Love You Philip Morris were good ones; I thought The Guardian was closest to the mark. PM made me laugh and it was undoubtedly a feelgood movie but it left a bad taste behind and I am sure that it meant to. The story is unbelievable but true. The protagonist Steven Jay Russell is a likeable fantasist  who is now serving 144 yrs for fraud in a Texas jail. Partly because dollars are sacred and then because he egged the faces of judges, financiers and the FBI to name but a few. You have to admire the guy: when you read the story an award would have been more appropriate, but then the yanks really don't share our sense of humour which is why distribution was a problem in the US. Reminded me of the Truman Show, Jim Cary's now next best film!

Seraphine

Film of the week, at least until I go to see I Love You Phillip Morris tomorrow, is Seraphine de Senlis. The beautifully drawn out portrait of the naive artist has won a stack of awards, well deserved.This article in the Guardian draws the obvious modern parallel. I was certain I have seen her work before, but have I? and where? Maybe it just fits with the current retro revival. Anyway I would love a poster! And a funny thing happened. In Michael Morpurgo's book War Horse he describes a pair of Haflingers but I am not sure I have ever seen one. In Seraphine there is a scene with two little horses and I straight away recalled the two little Haflingers in the book as if I had seen them in the flesh.That is what a writer can do. Just finished 'The Girls' by Lori Lansens, recommended. Walked today and celebrated the Spring, determined to soak up every moment.