home

 

These are some of the photos that I took with my pentax when I was home in Dunedin over Christmas.

I had never been to my parents’ new place at Waikouaiti before, but it feels so much like home that I may as well have spent much of my life there.  It is so much like our old bach near Reefton, on the West Coast – except with an awesome permaculture garden.

I didn’t realise how lovely it would be to be so close to cliffs and the sea.  I love that there is a whole new place for me to discover in microcosm detail, until I know all the trees and all the roads… all the little special places and how to get to them.  There is an entire stretch of coast just waiting for me to go back and explore it.

I miss how peaceful and grounding that place is already.

the wind-up owl chronicles

Today, I am a little wind-up owl.  Like one of these guys:

I wake up, tickle my cat, get up, catch two trains.  Work.  I am wearing my uniform.  Blurgh.  I catalogue books.  I help customers.  I write letters and then fold and stuff envelopes for mail outs.  But I have big eyes and lots of feathers, and I wait for night.

lazy sunday

I just spent almost an hour sitting on the couch watching my cat’s tail twitch.

Then I came upstairs and made a cute little manga version of myself. Aw.

(you can make your own here)

curled against her back, a dark comma against her pale elegant phrase

Roland and Maude’s obsession with clean white sheets in A.S. Byatt’s Posession has always resonated with me.  I love sleeping, and slow crumpled mornings tangled in bed linen… the warm, lingering sweetness of being in bed with someone you hold dear.  It is such moments that make the coming day seem so promising and that I find myself looking forward to as I drift into sleep.  No light is quite as good as that early morning light.  I love these moments.

I notice I’m not alone, however.  Claire Sloan takes beautiful time-lapse photographs of herself sleeping.  They are blurred and soft, the light is perfect.

And another Claire has a darling autobiographical flickr set of photographs of her recently vacated bed.  They always carry within them a yearning, a desire to not have to get up and leave the one she loves and go out into the greyness. To remain, swimming in vintage sheets and golden light in an empty room.

I had an interesting conversation with my dear friend Katrina recently, about the value of day-to-day happiness. Mornings spent between my red sheets are one such happiness for me.  A comma, a pause.

vulpine

I covet this fox scarf designed by UK textile artist Donna Wilson so much. I saw it in Dunedin Public Art Gallery when I was home at Christmas, and thought it was sweet… like an old fox stole, but playful and not at all dangerous to the real life foxes out there. Remember that pitiful moment in Grizzly Man when Timothy Treadwell cries over the dead fox? I don’t want anyone to weep over my clothing, but I do like the idea of a fox draped around my shoulders. Sartorial gestures towards woodland creatures are awesome.

So, yes… the desire for this quaint piece of fabric whimsy is growing. I have been a vulpine state of mind for a couple of weeks, now… and seeing Neko Case three times in the last week hasn’t helped.

I wants it.

the lonely sea in the sky

On Saturday evening Dave and went to Coogee and walked from there around the cliffs to Clovelly.  There are few things I like better than scrabbling up and over rocks, and I haven’t done it in a long, long time.  We stopped for a while at Gordons Bay, looked at crabs scuttling away from us in every direction, and took photos.  By the time we were finished, the sun on the water was low and silver.

It was a lovely day.

Next time I will go swimming.

to ride the bus to the outskirts…

                           (of the fact)

                                                          (that I need love)

My friend Rowena and I caught the train up to Katoomba on Sunday afternoon.  We arrived to dry heat and the humming of cicadas at high altitude, and immediately found a nice shady, spot in the garden where we could sit on the grass and drink gin and tonics.

Which was perfect… the cicadas, the moments that you spend with women which lead you to realise that you could have/should have been childhood friends, all of it…

Because the rest of the evening was spent with Neko Case.

Neko and her band played a very small intimate show at the Clarendon Hotel in Katoomba on Sunday night.  And we were seated right at the front of the room, only about a meter from the stage.  It was so wonderful being able to watch Jon Rauhouse on the banjo and lap steel up close, and he told a hilarious story about being mistaken for a miner by a 14 year old boy on the plane over.   The banter between the band members was just lovely, as always.  They know how to make a crowd feel at home, even if they themselves are jet lagged or jittery. 

I was just generally enchanted and exhausted and brilliantly happy.  The whole evening was wonderful.  Even the opening act, Jordie Lane, was a revelation. 

Listening to music that I love so dearly live always leaves me a little emotionally raw.  So I am a little ragged around the edges today… but am going for another dose tonight at the Recital Hall nonetheless.

I am holding out for Star Witness.

Sushi Success!

Thanks to Dave for this awesome fujiroid. 

How retro is our kitchen?

The end of the week…

Tonight I am making… sushi!

I am thinking of trying eggplant sushi, although I have never made it before. I guess even if it doesn’t work out, I still have eggplant with miso to eat!

I am also a fan of sushi with pickles in it… never would have tried it, except for two lonely months when I first moved to Sydney working at St Vincents Hospital. Everything on Oxford St was so expensive, so I started buying lunch from this cheap little sushi place that had really gross sushi fillings (bad sushi is a crime, people). The only ones that seemed okay were the pickle and vegetable ones, and they were delicious. So I am going to go buy some pickles, eggplant and chicken on my way home. And then… let the rolling begin!

Home, on a shady street, then library-bound

It feels good being back in Sydney.  Beth woke me up this morning (I broke my alarm clock the other night, so no more sheep and crickets in the morning) and we got a coffee at Scrambled and then went… fabric shopping!

I will soon have a beautiful new summery little black dress, minimalist, with the only embellishment being the construction of the garment itself – my favourite kind.

I was wearing a very cute parisian outfit this morning, a little black skirt and patent black flats with a stripey blue and white top.  I ruined this outfit before our day had really even started, however, by spilling coffee all down my front.  Never take the lid off your coffee in the car, ever.  A rookie mistake from a card-carrying pedestrian.

So after my delightful morning off (which also involved listening to Regina Spektor’s Fidelity on repeat, a delicious white peach, and reading Bolaño in the hammock with my cat for company), I felt entitled to wear my new, awesome Andrew Bird tee to work this afternoon.  Apparently this breaks a cardinal rule of concert shirt etiquette, because you are not supposed to wear a new concert tee for at least two weeks after you have attended said show. 

I went to see Andrew Bird play in the Concert hall at Sydney Opera House on Sunday night with Dave, after flying back from NZ that morning.  It was such a delightful show.  Tables and Chairs made my cry it was so good.  I didn’t have enough cash to buy anything at the merch stand, but I really wanted one of the tees, because they came in my favourite red and had a bird that is also an LP on the front, that reminded me of Charley Harper’s birds.  Dave was remarkably sweet and found the ten extra dollars in schrapnel that I needed to make up the price.  I adore that boy.

And that, my friends, is the extended story behind today’s library-girl outfit.  I don’t care if the hipsters say it’s too soon.  What’s so wrong with commemorating a wonderful evening?  Life is great.  A friend told me last night that he could tell that I was well by my syntax, and it’s true!  It feels good to be back at work.  Everything is wonderful.  This is going to be the year of productive and awesome.