They Dance Alone

 

 

 

"What do we glean from the stories of other women?

What am I gleaning in the furrows of my mother's journals?


I forage for the details left, overlooked, discarded.  I will use everything in this story she has given me before her death and afterward to find out what is there and what is not there, and then begin culling the grain from the chaff, savoring what is essential.


Mother gave me my voice by withholding hers, both in life and in death.  Her creativity presided in her home.  She spoke through gestures, largely quiet and graceful.  A letter.  A meal.  A walk together.  Her touch.  She lived on a private elegant plain.
Mimi gave me my voice by proclaiming hers: directly, honestly, and, at times, shockingly.  When Brooke and I went to tell her we were getting married, she said, 'How wonderful!  And if it doesn't work out, you can always get a divorce.'

But I believe my own voice continues to be found wherever I am being present and responding from my heart, moment by moment.  My voice is born repeatedly in the fields of uncertainty."

-Except from Mary Tempest William's "When Women Were Birds: Fifty Four Variations on Voice"



Allium Bud: Tears
Rocky Mountain Columbine: Cuckold, Capricuousness, and Folly (or image of doves as Shane Connolly suggests)
Sir Winston Churchill Daffodil: Chivalry
Bramley Apple Blossom: Repentance
Strawberries: Perfect Goodness, Excellence
Quince: Temptation

 Resource for flower meanings from "Discovering the Language of Flowers" by the ever thoughtful Shane Connolly




Musical Inspiration: Sting's "They Dance Alone"

Spring Morning Songs

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

These photographs tell their own little story, separate from me, of my days these past few months.  They can't tell the whole of the story.  Nor, I think, can I.  The story is still being written, being lived, being known.

 

Strips become squares become patchwork becoming a quilt.  Garden flowers on tables welcome special Easter guests. Bulbs buried in autumn in struggle, blossom in spring to life.  Meaning that now Sir Winston Churchill lives in my garden.  The Queen is having her day and Yellow Cheerfulness spreads into my home.  Or so I hope.

 

A little experiment is at play in the kitchen.  Taking inspiration from different places and adventuring to create something of my own. Drawing from a recipe found in "Garden Design" magazine from the previous winter and mixing it with a scone recipe given to me years ago by a coworker at the time.  Using the fruits of the season.  It almost turns out just the way I want.  A few tweaks still to try. I don't mind trying again.

 

Dreaming of embroidering little flowers using the crabapple blossom photo as inspiration alongside the beautiful work of Caroline Zoob and too the ladies participating in The Stitchery Journal project.  But first a quilt must be finished.  It is now policy for me to only do one craft project at a time.  Hard as it can be sometimes to stop myself from delving into the next new creative thing.  Life for me flows better this way.  I do wonder if the desire to stitch these little flower pictures will come into fruition or if by the time I finish the quilt something else will strike my fancy more?  It's a real fear.

 

So many things not captured in photographs.  Not captured in words.  Only quietly, with a whisper, felt with the heart.  Joy, sorrow, grief, emptiness, renewal, hope, struggle, and strength.  Music and silence.  It's all here.

Autumn Begins