pretty colours – Page 2

Warm-up, someone made some effort, starting the sauce

1. Around the time of her usual lunchtime walk, her tail starts wagging even though the rest of her is dozing on the sofa. “It’s a warm-up, like stretching,” I tell John.

2. The boxes are coloured to indicate who they’re for – the big cat, the little cat or the dog. The colours – rich raspberry, burnt orange and cool purple – are contrasting complements, and until I see them together in the bag, I didn’t realise spot-on flea treatment packaging could be so pretty.

3. It takes a while for the smell to reach me – the sweet scent frying onions and the garlic – but when it does, I suddenly develop an appetite.

Three Beautiful Things before breakfast

26/7/2010 / louisa / 0 Comments

(Well, actually, during the night/before my alarm went off to start the day, but that “before breakfast” has got a better ring to it.)

1. When it is dark: the world is as silent and still as I’ve ever heard it her. No wind in the trees, no traffic noise, no birds or animals making noises in the woods. The whole world is asleep (except me).

2. When it is dawn: even without my glasses, I can see the eruption on the horizon. Above the treeline, the whole sky turns red.

3. When it is daylight: in what feels like the blink of an eye, the red disappears and is replaced by brilliant blue, dotted with white fluffy clouds. Often when I wake in the early morning like this, the sky is like this – a kid’s drawing of a perfect summer sky – and as always, I momentarily consider getting up to enjoy it, but then, on cue, I fall asleep again.

Crack, a pretty coincidence, accomplishment

25/7/2010 / louisa / 0 Comments

1. The sharp snap as I break the twigs.

2. The arrangement of the washing on the line looks deliberately composed. The duck-egg blue of the bath towels, the washed out mid-blue of the dog ones and the soft turquoise & cream of the tea towels all coordinate while standing out against the leafy green backdrop.

3. A productive day and completing a goal – a meal made entirely from stuff from our garden.

Office humour, passing over, step by step

23/7/2010 / louisa / 0 Comments

1. Sometimes our banter is so perfectly timed that it sounds almost scripted (in a good way).

2. A flash of red reflected in the stream as John steps from bank to bank.

3. The design evolves step by step until it’s just right.

Breakfast, animals x 3, showcase x3

11/7/2010 / louisa / 0 Comments

1. The sweetness of the crisp bacon, the sourness of the muffin, the silkiness of the scrambled egg and the substantial chewiness of the sausage. A great breakfast.

2. Animals:

a) The chickens cluck around me, interested in what I’m doing to their drinker, to their grit hopper and to their coop. When I’m working on their nest boxes – in the strip of no-man’s-land outside their enclosed run, they gather around the run door watching and waiting for my return into their world – or plotting their escape, it’s hard to tell which. After I’m done, I take them borage leaves and before I can bend down to give them out, one cheeky girl flies up and snatches one out of my hand. Definitely getting braver.

b) She looks like a puppy when her back legs bounce up at the same time. I think she knows it too, knows to do that so we can’t help but fall in love with her more.

c) Boron is asleep in Lily’s bed – her big dog bed that’s actually a bit too big for her. Boron looks tiny in the cushioned oval, his extended paw clawing on/off at the blanket as I talk to him.

3. The last night of the showcase:

a) The scrap of paper – torn to just the minimum then folded many times to much delight – finally makes it back to me just in time for the start of the show.

b) I’m more nervous tonight than I have been because John’s in the audience and I want them to do a good job so he’ll enjoy it. Afterwards, he says he did.

c) From where I’m sat, I can’t see the action, just a slither of stage at the very back. Their shadows – from many different light sources – are overlaid so many times that they’re abstract strips of light and dark.

3BT – keeping separate, worth the work, evening walk

17/6/2010 / louisa / 0 Comments

1. The clear oil cuts through the beetroot-stained vinegar on the plate.

2. I’m re-reading ‘I Capture The Castle’ by Dodie Smith yet again. The introduction to my edition tells me: “[Dodie] rewrote every line, under [husband] Alec’s critical supervision, hearing every line of dialogue in her head and unable to stop thinking about it even in bed. … She kept a 100,000 word notebook on the progress of the novel, recording how each character changed, and how even the minor characters, down to the [family]’s dog and cat, were kept in play.” One of my most favourite books.

3. After dinner, we go for a walk in the woods – I want to show John the new meadow I found and a balmy summer evening seems to be the perfect time to do it. We follow the faint paths to it, then through it, then away from it, stretching out into the horses fields then twisting back in the woods and home. We’re sweaty and nursing nettle stings by the time we make it home but have had a wonderful time.

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