I had a dream last night that my friend called me to tell me that were 3 baby woodpeckers on Spottiswoode street, I can't remember if I found them or not but I did either have some kind of vision or found a nest with three big blue eggs with brown speckles. Last week I had another nest dream where I was walking around the streets and kept seeing nests in trees and then I came to a house on the wall of which was mounted flat a huge nest lined with feathers and lichens. It was so big I'm sure I could have slept in it. Maybe that's what I'm looking for!


Here is one I saw the other day, it's nice that all the nests are so visible in winter as the trees are bare but sometimes it feels that that may be one of the only nice things about winter. Never mind, in a few weeks everything will be filled with life again but of course winter is beautiful and necessary, it just makes me feel tired and run down.

Since I finished The Waves and To The Lighthouse I started reading the Vintage publication of Selected Letters by Virginia Woolf. I feel that same lovely deep involved feeling that I had while reading Katherine Mansfield's Journal and Larkin's Letters to Monica. I read something so delightful and funny in her letters from her early twenties. When writing to Violet Dickinson, Virginia would often call herself "Sparroy". She seemed to have a complicated system of animals names for her family and intimate friends. "Sparroy" was apparently a fantastical small animal of her own invention, half-bird half-monkey perhaps and capable of snuggling (!) Violet was 20 years older than Virginia and was means to have been very sympathetic and warm and believed that Virginia would one day be a great writer. The relationship was also flirtatious and romantic and occassionaly passionate, at least on Virginia's side.

Your letters come like balm on the heart. I really think I must do what I never have done--try to keep them. I've never kept a single letter all my life--but this romantic friendship ought to be preserved. Very few people have any feelings to express-at least of affection of sympathy--and if those that do feel dont express-the worlds so much more like a burnt out moon--cold living for the Sparroys and Violets.

I also had a little debate with my friend on the subject of reading the private letters of deceased people. He seemed to be greatly opposed to it and saw it as a great intrusion and almost a cruelty to publish these personal documents whereas I have always found it quite natural and never really felt like I was doing something against someones will. Maybe as I am so involved in fiction, I cant see the reality of it and it just feels like another book to me. Many published journals and letters were never intended to be read, some people spend their lives making sure what they write will be publishable. I'm sure there are things I have written which I would never want anyone to read but maybe one should try to let go of these precious feelings about what one leaves behind, whether it be the object of the human body after death or the letters or diaries we might have written. I do believe there is a case for sensitivity if for example, there are other people still alive who may be hurt or deeply offended by certain things being published but if the timing is appropriate and sensitive then I think that if the result of one persons private letters being published is that hundreds or thousands of perhaps (even just one) are able to learn and be enlightened and given joy then it is a benefit that this happened. I did feel slightly strange after this conversation when I then read Virginia Woolfs last letter which was to her husband Leonard and the last lines reading You will destroy all my papers. Maybe I don't really know what is right or wrong after all. That's my usual conclusion for all things...

Oh I wanted to give a sneak-peak of a new set Cherry shot for me when we were first reunited after four years. I don't want to give away too much on what it is about just yet but maybe you can guess....




Tomorrow I will be sending out the first batch of prints I have sold and there are still a couple of each image left from this order so just let me know if you would like one. More info under the spoiler below. Thanks so much to anyone who bought one. I have enjoyed wrapping them up and writing thank you notes :-)





About PRINTS

Goodbye for now. Be warm, read and flourish xx

Thank goodness for books.