A Return to Some Normality - and a bit of introspection

Thank you to all of my friends who - sort of - commiserated with me on my recent accident. I take laughter and shocked horror as commiseration and concern!

As you can see my face has returned to its normal proportions - it is still as crooked as the crooked man in the Nursery Rhyme, but apparently that is a birth defect - I think I must have suffered some trauma coming down the birth canal. But hey ho! I have no recollection of it and have become used to my lopsided nose now - i don't remember it ever holding me back and when I got my nose pierced at 16 it made the decision of which side to pierce much easier really. Though I do think that it has become more crooked as the years have passed, but as my looks are far less important by this time of my life - it really does not matter that much.

That said - i have just spent five minutes writing about it so it must mean something to me! Hmmmm?

Otherwise life has returned to normal - that is i spend an inordinate length of time in front of my computer - writing and drawing and manipulating images. My tan has quite faded, so now I have to make the effort to spend a half an hour outside every day. I try to sit out for my lunch - although today it was too hot and i go for a slow, leisurely walk in the afternoon to the shops to get anything that I need.

I still do my morning walk.

My morning walk is probably more important for a number of reasons, although it will not make me go brown.

First of all for my health - it is the only exercise I get nowadays, although I am trying to do a few stretches again now to keep limber. Those I do throughout the day as a break from sitting at the computer.

Secondly for my education - I plug into my little Ipod and do my aural and oral Spanish lessons - which of course makes me look totally mad as people see me striding along talking to myself. I try not to move my lips too much or to speak too loudly, but with earplugs in you can never be too sure.

Thirdly I get to check that everything is in its place in town and that the mountains have not shifted and if there is any building work going on I can inspect progress on a daily basis. It is no wonder that I am exhausted by ten o'clock in the morning!

Anyway, regarding insects and spiders and any other uninvited guests to this house I now have a military regime in hand - especially in the bedroom where I am the most vulnerable as I do tend to sleep like a log and honestly the house could fall down around my ears and i would not wake. It involves absolute cleanliness and a few well placed insecticides.

That said - the other day I was minding my own business, upstairs, tapping away on my computer when there was an almighty crash from the kitchen and sensing the worst I rushed down the stairs. I had made an omelette for my lunch that day - but it was rather large so i transferred half of it onto another plate and left in on the work top to cool, before putting it in the fridge. It was not there long, because i knew that i would have to check it for ants and get it into the fridge ASAP. But there it now lay on the floor amongst the debris of a smashed dinner plate. I can only conclude that it was a cat as they are the newest visitors that i have seen skulking around lately. So even though I may be living solo at the moment - and only temporarily - I am not alone, nor do I seem to get the chance to be lonely with all this colourful wildlife!

So there you have it!

'Pupa' and the return from Spain

Hello,

I am back from Spain.

I had a wonderful time, very busy (i will tell you a little bit about that in a minute) and it was very warm so I am FREEZING now back in Norway!

I decided to use this picture today because that is how i am feeling. A little bit sleepy and introspective and I would dearly love to curl up in my duvet and have a little sleep today. As you can probably guess this is a little study of Metamoth curled up in her pupa, still dozing but pretty close to being reborn.

There is not a whole lot more to say about this picture except that I really like those colours. I use them quite a lot, especially those sap and olive greens with the pale pink and flesh tones of madder and rose dore. Rose dore was my latest discovery, the last time I was buying watercolours. I love it because it works so well as a flesh tone and then you can blush it up with a little rose madder.

I told you last week that I was off to Spain for a little holiday, this was strictly speaking not quite true as it was in fact a working holiday and fact finding mission.

Two years ago I took the plunge of buying a little house in a pretty little town in Andalucia.

My faithful and patient man, who just happened along as the sale was closing, therefore inherited a vast project that he never envisaged when he asked me out on that first date. You see - being me - I did not buy a ready house that you could walk into, but rather more a shell of a house. That said we have camped there over the last couple of years quite happily - except for the first time trying to sleep on an airbed! Nightmare, as the air just would not stay in it so that in the morning we were sleeping directly on a hard tiled floor. Not very good for my back at all!

About a year ago we began work with a really nice Spanish architect and finally after an awful lot of planning and discussion work has just begun on the house. Only demolition at the moment, but you know you have to break eggs to make omelettes. We have all really enjoyed the process, as there was no real rush at first, although now I have to admit I am just aching for the house to be finished so that we can take up residence there and start having all our friends coming to stay.

This trip was first and foremost a mission to seek out tiles, doors and other such fixtures and fittings. The week flew by in a bit of a whirlwind and I am still trying to remember and process all we viewed and discussed. Of course the couple of glasses of wine with a late lunch every day did not really help my energy levels, but I am still maintaining that it was the sunshine and heat that did for me in the afternoon!

Now, I have for some time been planning to run art holidays when we finally move down there and that was the other aspect of the trip - a fact-finding mission for these art holidays. This could not have been more successful as I had by chance booked into a lovely Bed and Breakfast (Casa de Orange http://www.casadeorange.com/_en/main.html) just around the corner, which has exactly the right ambience that I was looking for. That takes care of the residence for the students.

As further luck would have it there was also another artist staying there at the same time (Natalia Romero http://www.nataliaromero.nl/) and would you believe it, she was actually giving painting lessons to a couple of students who were with her. As you can imagine we got talking and after sharing conversations and ideas we finally got down to the real business of discussing a new plan of running holidays together in future.

I could not be happier as I can be a bit shy, so the thought of setting the whole thing up on my own was a bit daunting. With someone else, with relevant experience it will be a real joy!

She was also delighted at the thought of having the company of another tutor in future so we are really looking forward to making proper plans over the next few months with the hope of taking bookings for next summer. An added plus is the fact that as she is a painter and I am primarily a sculptor we should be able to devise some very interesting programs of study for our students.

So now you can probably understand why I am so physically and mentally exhausted - but also quietly really excited. Life suddenly got more interesting!