Tag: friends

Metamorphosis

rebekahdwyer

The last week or so has been like travelling through a dream. I am walking past the various homes we have imagined in the last year, long grass snagging my feet to which I pay little attention. I look backwards through a field. Clouds are grey, wind is pushing at my left temple, hair blows across my face. I turn my head into the wind once more but the wind has turned into a soft, warm breeze. The scene has changed. The field is gone. Instead there is a cottage. Roses climb over the front door, sunlight falls in shafts through the trees across the garden.

We waited and waited on the land. It looks like we have exhausted all the possibilities. It has all come down to the overage. This is a covenant with several beneficiaries, many of whom are charitable organisations. It states in very ambiguous language that if more than one dwelling, or perhaps if one dwelling with a larger footprint than the current house is built, then we would have 60 days to pay 30% of the increase in the value of the land. We could possibly get a figure on what that would be; almost certainly within the tens of thousands. But no one except the beneficiaries can tell us if our plans would trigger it. The ones we’ve never actually heard from at all, despite having asked several things of them. We tried surveyors; we tried solicitors. These types of case are really unpredictable if they go to court. And there’s no way we want to go to court. So we kept on waiting. Maybe they would respond.

And then we saw Rose Cottage. It’s not far from the land; a more sheltered spot with weeping willow and birch in the garden and roses around the door (not so much in February actually, but a front garden full of snowdrops). It has the kitchen/dining/living space we hoped for. And some really horrible carpets. Surely this can’t be ours? Seems like maybe it can.

On one hand, I don’t want to let the dream of the land and a self-build go. On the other, I know things change. Maybe when the kids are grown we’ll build a little hut in a field. Or maybe we will keep living this dream; it’s a good one. It’s not something we need to know. We have found contentment living in a little rented house. Now we need to take that with us into the next steps of this adventure.

Comparison

rebekahdwyer

Today I did some painting. I’ve only just started to learn about how to use watercolours and I’m not rolling in natural talent. That’s ok, it’s not the point. Until it didn’t feel OK.

A curious thing happened a week or so ago. I’ve been doing online tutorials for about a fortnight and one evening we thought it would be fun for three of us to do one together. The other two people were two of my favourite people. Laid back, not at all competative. It was just a nice thing to do whilst hanging out in an evening. Except that then for me it wasn’t. No one said it, but at least to me my picture was obviously the worst. It was a picture of a goldfish and we were all doing the same thing. On mine the eye was too small. The shape wasn’t quite right. It was not good to look at it. It didn’t feel good to have painted it. Instead of being a fun, relaxing thing, it felt like a sad thing. I didn’t paint again until today.

That was pretty silly. My paintings are never going to be good enough to go on display, I’m not aspiring to be a great artist. I am realistic. I was just enjoying splashing paint around and watching the colours blend and swirl. And the comparison was entirely in my own head. On the actual evening, the comments went as far as “it was fun how he did the tail”, and “I like how the colours have mixed on his tummy”. Still I thought mine was awful. Maybe objectively it was. I certainly took the least amount of time to do it which is probably relevant to the outcome. I wonder why we ruin things by comparison. Which is to say, I wonder why I took all the fun away for myself by comparing my picture with the others. Those feelings were mostly internal and came entirely from me and three fish pictures. I also wonder if I could manage to not look at all three and think mine was the worst. I’m not totally sure I have control over that, which is a real shame as I would like to consciously decide not to mind. I suppose I’ve got over it and gone back to the paint pot and carried on. Maybe sometimes life just hurts a little and we need time to heal. I think I’m missing something.

A good thing that has come from the experience is that I’ve realised that I most enjoy quick painting, sploshes of colour and quick brush strokes. I’m just not a slowly and carefully sort of person. I never have been. It would be good to develop more of that; I have been trying and I think I’ve made some progress, but when it comes to things for fun that might not be my focus. That’s lead to the discovery of Steven Cronin’s watercolour tutorials on YouTube. They are really fun. He’s a great slosher of paint and I like how a lot of his pictures look. And I quite like how some of my paint-along pictures look too. Something I noticed quite quickly is that my pictures never look the same as his. I don’t think this is only because of his talent and experience. I think it’s also because we are different people so we make different things. I wonder if that’s why it hurts when I compare my pictures with others. Inside there is a connection between my picture and me. If my picture is a worse picture, perhaps I am a worse human. If that’s the connection I’m making no wonder it hurts. What an odd connection to make. There are some violent criminals who are excellent painters, and some extraordinarily altruistic individuals who don’t paint at all. And even that is a false dichotomy, trying to make good people and bad people, let alone tying that to a random skill like the wielding of a paint brush.

Instead of concluding that I am a poor painter and a bad person I should conclude that I’m just a person who enjoys playing with paint and that that has nothing to do with some unhelpful assessment of my value as a person. Maybe I can also realise that comparison is generally unhelpful and unnecessary but that it is hard to avoid. In which case, time to heal is no bad thing and can come with a little more understanding. It’s all about growth, after all.

Obviously the picture I’ve used is the one I think is the best that I’ve done. In the hope that people say “oh, that’s a nice picture”. Alas, growth takes time…

Clouds lifting

rebekahdwyer

Today the cloud lifted. I’d been trying not to look at the cloud but it hung heavy and closed the doors for a while. I don’t know why, or quite how long it stayed or why this morning it felt better. I am glad it feels better. It was odd though. Suddenly I could run faster. I’m just finishing the Couch to 5k programme. It worked, now I can run for a good while and keep going. Yesterday I didn’t go for a run. The cloud was crouching too low, my legs were too heavy, doing anything was hard. Today I could run, and faster than last week, much faster than yesterday. Strange, the physical impact of something that I assume is primarily in my head.

At the weekend we were away camping with friends. It was nice, the place was pretty, the food was good. It was really hard. Somehow the doors were closed and only the dark colours could get through. A bit like when in Harry Potter the Death Eaters put a charm on the stairs so only those with the Dark Mark can get through. Eventually the jinx is broken but it’s pretty gloomy in the meantime.

It would be useful to understand why the cloud descended, and what made it blow away. I’m not certain there’s an answer. Perhaps there are factors. I found it very emotional moving out of my parent’s house and wanted to surpress that as much I could, for everyone’s sake. It was busy moving house, and everything takes a bit more effort, finding the things in the house, finding my way out of it. I’m really good at getting lost. Or maybe for a while my brain didn’t make enough of what it needs to make me feel happy and then one day it did again.

I think this is something a lot of people go through. It’s not the first, or the worst time for me. I’m really glad it’s past. At least for now.