Thanks so much to everyone who posted their 'three things' over the last week. I've been inspired by reading your words, by the inherent power that resides in the precise observation of everyday things, events, memories. I know I'll be reading them all again.
I have to take a break from AppleHouse for a couple of weeks. My poor Mam, in Wales, has had a fall and a hip replacement and isn't doing too well in hosiptal and I'm flying back on 1st June to see her and hopefully be there for when she goes home where I can look after her for a little while. I'm not sure how long I'll be away but hope to be back posting and chatting to you all by the middle of June.
Keep writing well.
L x
Monday, May 31, 2010
Sunday, May 30, 2010
7 Day Writing Challenge - Day 7
Already at the end? The week's gone toooo quick : )
1. tree roots push up the tarmac on Chemin de Sable we have things to say
2. I buy strawberries, but not any strawberries. I buy Gariguette strawberries whose scent can be detected through the cellophane wrapper. A barquette of red hearts, small, soft, aromatic. And the lady at the greengrocer's gives me a rose - Bonne fete, she says. It is Mothers' Day this weekend, and even though I am no-one's mother I still get a long stemmed, peach rose. Strawberries and roses. Kindness and sunshine.
2. We go to Juan les Pins tonight and drink rose wine at the bar and eat the little plates of amuse-guele that the Bar Crystal serves with drinks between 6 and 8pm: green olive tapenade, pizza squares, plates that keep coming, and coming, because Lionel, the barman, likes us. So many plates we need no dinner.
1. tree roots push up the tarmac on Chemin de Sable we have things to say
2. I buy strawberries, but not any strawberries. I buy Gariguette strawberries whose scent can be detected through the cellophane wrapper. A barquette of red hearts, small, soft, aromatic. And the lady at the greengrocer's gives me a rose - Bonne fete, she says. It is Mothers' Day this weekend, and even though I am no-one's mother I still get a long stemmed, peach rose. Strawberries and roses. Kindness and sunshine.
2. We go to Juan les Pins tonight and drink rose wine at the bar and eat the little plates of amuse-guele that the Bar Crystal serves with drinks between 6 and 8pm: green olive tapenade, pizza squares, plates that keep coming, and coming, because Lionel, the barman, likes us. So many plates we need no dinner.
Saturday, May 29, 2010
7 Day Writing Challenge - Day 6
1. When Magda speaks she tosses her long, blonde hair, primps her lips, tightens her eyes. Today she wears a fuscia pink shirt. Yesterday, a black Calvin Klein t-shirt. Her eyelids are perfectly outlined, an exquisite tick upwards at the corners. I can't help staring when she runs one hand through her hair, when she brings both of them together in front of her on the table. Still. When she looks at me I feel she is really listening to what I have to say.
2. grass cuttings and puddles over the paving stones the cat flicks its tail
3. On her 6th day in hospital my mother sounds tired but positive. 'No more sentiment,' she says, 'I'm getting rid of the walnut headboard and footboard and buying an electric bed.' The boards match the his and her wardrobes and dressing table, the bedroom suite she's had since she was married in 1952. The suite that I have always known in this house where I was born. The wood is smooth, rich and dark, the grain patterned with knots and whorls. My parents' bedroom is at the back of the house and in my memory it is always in shade. Walking in there made me feel like whispering.
2. grass cuttings and puddles over the paving stones the cat flicks its tail
3. On her 6th day in hospital my mother sounds tired but positive. 'No more sentiment,' she says, 'I'm getting rid of the walnut headboard and footboard and buying an electric bed.' The boards match the his and her wardrobes and dressing table, the bedroom suite she's had since she was married in 1952. The suite that I have always known in this house where I was born. The wood is smooth, rich and dark, the grain patterned with knots and whorls. My parents' bedroom is at the back of the house and in my memory it is always in shade. Walking in there made me feel like whispering.
Friday, May 28, 2010
7 Day Writing Challenge - Day 5
Sorry, I'm a bit late today...
5th Day. Nearly there. Don't give up : )
1. A few red poppies between the leylandai at the edge of the garden, and one, completely on its own, in the centre of the lawn, though by the time I walk out to look at it close up the petals have been blown from the stem, or brushed off by the cat, and scattered in the grass. Such things that are beautiful but so quickly disappear.
2. Trim the fat from a magret de canard, score the skin in a diamond pattern, press crushed green and black peppercorns, crushed coriander and cardamom seeds into the flesh. Cook in a hot skillet, skin side down to burn off the fat, for 6 minutes, then turn and cook for 6, 7 or 8 minutes depending on whether you like it rare, medium, or well done. Let it rest on a wooden board for 5 minutes. Fry thin slices of apple in a small amount of butter for 1 or 2 minutes on each side. By now the juices will have started to ooze from the duck. Slice the duck thinly and fan out on the cooked apple. It was delicieux.
3. an armful of fresh laundry these days I feel I am waiting for things to happen
5th Day. Nearly there. Don't give up : )
1. A few red poppies between the leylandai at the edge of the garden, and one, completely on its own, in the centre of the lawn, though by the time I walk out to look at it close up the petals have been blown from the stem, or brushed off by the cat, and scattered in the grass. Such things that are beautiful but so quickly disappear.
2. Trim the fat from a magret de canard, score the skin in a diamond pattern, press crushed green and black peppercorns, crushed coriander and cardamom seeds into the flesh. Cook in a hot skillet, skin side down to burn off the fat, for 6 minutes, then turn and cook for 6, 7 or 8 minutes depending on whether you like it rare, medium, or well done. Let it rest on a wooden board for 5 minutes. Fry thin slices of apple in a small amount of butter for 1 or 2 minutes on each side. By now the juices will have started to ooze from the duck. Slice the duck thinly and fan out on the cooked apple. It was delicieux.
3. an armful of fresh laundry these days I feel I am waiting for things to happen
Thursday, May 27, 2010
7 Day Writing Challenge - Day 4
About the challenge.
1. Our first two, tiny, green, plum tomatoes on the plant in the pot where a line of ants tracks to, twice a day, from the rosemary bush at the edge of the terrace, across the paving stones, under the wooden slatted sunbed, and over the cat, if she happens to be sitting there, in the shade.
2. On my desk: a pension letter from HSBC, a black and white photograph of me at 22, an open diary with my brother's birthday marked on 31 May, a calculator, a mobile phone and charger, my glasses, the latest copy of the Frogpond journal, two retractable pencils whose rubber ends have gone hard, a cup of coffee, lukewarm, a list of french and english vocabulary for my hairdresser, a note of the hospital phone number and address where my mam is recovering after a fall and hip replacement, magnetic letters from which I've made the word 'MUCH'.
3. Lots of people keep their shutters closed here, not just at night, or when they're out, or away from home, but during the day when they're there. I think of secrets, of drawers with keys. Of looking over shoulders. Once, at a neighbour's drinks party, a woman got up and left when favourable talk of Marechal Petain began.
1. Our first two, tiny, green, plum tomatoes on the plant in the pot where a line of ants tracks to, twice a day, from the rosemary bush at the edge of the terrace, across the paving stones, under the wooden slatted sunbed, and over the cat, if she happens to be sitting there, in the shade.
2. On my desk: a pension letter from HSBC, a black and white photograph of me at 22, an open diary with my brother's birthday marked on 31 May, a calculator, a mobile phone and charger, my glasses, the latest copy of the Frogpond journal, two retractable pencils whose rubber ends have gone hard, a cup of coffee, lukewarm, a list of french and english vocabulary for my hairdresser, a note of the hospital phone number and address where my mam is recovering after a fall and hip replacement, magnetic letters from which I've made the word 'MUCH'.
3. Lots of people keep their shutters closed here, not just at night, or when they're out, or away from home, but during the day when they're there. I think of secrets, of drawers with keys. Of looking over shoulders. Once, at a neighbour's drinks party, a woman got up and left when favourable talk of Marechal Petain began.
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