And the winter begins in earnest.

And the winter begins in earnest.
December 6th 2013

It feels like an age since I last posted anything, it’s hard to believe we only have another couple of weeks until the shortest day. The sun sits low in the sky, the shadows are long and darkness descends as the children finish school. Days are short, nights are long, temperatures hover around zero and dip below as the soon as the sun sets. 
Neither of my paintings made it into the final selection for the exhibition. I was disappointed; but more disappointed in the way I found out. We were told we would get a rejection letter in the post the week before the exhibition if our paintings were not selected and if we didn’t hear anything…………….the paintings were in. I waited and waited, I figured the best I could hope for was to get one accepted. The paintings were submitted on 16th November, the private viewing was two weeks later on 29th November and I was expecting my rejection letter sometime before the private viewing. It never turned up; I checked the post every day but no letter. I couldn’t believe it, by the Thursday I was as they say ‘quietly confident’; in fact I was so confident I went out and bought a new outfit to wear to the private viewing. I really don’t know why but on the Friday afternoon, just a couple of hours before the exhibition was about to open, I phoned the gallery for confirmation. The girl I spoke to was very blasé, almost dismissive, she said all the letters had been sent out and if I hadn’t received a letter my paintings had been selected. I asked her if she was sure, she sounded bored but said yes, I said thank you very much and was about to hang up but then, at the last minute I said…………..please could you check, you must have a list or something, please go and check. Reluctantly she agreed and went off to check. After some discussion and debate with her colleague, she came back and asked if I was sure I hadn’t received my letter !! Bloody stupid girl its not as if I would just ‘forget’. What did she expect me to say?? Oh yes now you mention it maybe I did get a letter?? Anyway…………..turns out my rejection letter was sent and I never received it. Neither of my paintings made it into the exhibition. I couldn’t face going to the private viewing. I would have gone if I had found out earlier in the week but finding out like that a couple of hours before the opening was a bit hard so I didn’t go. One week on and my letter still hasn’t arrived, tomorrow I have to go to the gallery to collect the paintings. I feel ok about it now. As every one keeps telling me, there’s always next year.
The day after the private viewing I traveled south. My mother is in her 80’s and lives alone. My sister lives around the corner from her and is more or less her carer. I do try to get down see them a couple of times a year, but it’s not always easy. Anyway, we had a great time, Mum was really well and we sat and looked at lots of old photos and talked about all sorts of things. We went out to lunch, went around a couple of junk shops and generally enjoyed each others company for a little while. Mum gets lonely now. She can’t get out on her own very much and in the winter she goes out even less, she hates the long nights, she sits indoors on her own most evenings. I’m going to try to get down again after Christmas.
The journey home on Thursday was strange. The weather forecast for Thursday was bad, very bad, but I already had the tickets so; bad weather or not, I had to go. I was up at 5, on the bus at 7 and by 8 I could see the wind whipping the last of the leaves off the trees. Progress was slow, the wind became stronger and stronger, at one point I thought we would have to get off the road, I could feel the coach being blown across the motorway. Being on a coach all day means you sit, you read, you eat, you drink, you look out of the window and you have no idea what’s going on anywhere except on the bus. As the light faded the tiniest sliver of a silver moon rose in the sky, for a while it was quite beautiful, but then the cloud and snow obscured the view. The coach finally reached Glasgow over an hour late. The connecting bus back to Dundee was running almost 3 hours late, all we knew was that the timetables were disrupted due to severe weather conditions plus a couple of accidents on the road.  I reached Dundee just in time to catch the last bus home and when that bus finally arrived, the wind was howling, the streets were deserted, there was a light dusting of snow over every thing and I jumped into the only taxi available. I arrived home at half past midnight. I made coffee and put the TV on. Only then did I learn that Nelson Mandela had died. I had been stuck in a coach all day, and unknown to me, one of the greatest men on earth had died. I know he was 95, a good age for anyone, but with his passing an era has ended. He left this world a very different place to the one he entered and many of the changes are a direct result of his intervention. There aren’t many people who actually change the world but he did. I also learned that the storm we had driven through had blown trucks off the road in Scotland, killing at least one of the drivers. One of the highest tides in memory had caused flooding all up the east coast of England and  apparently; the Thames flood barriers had been raised to prevent serious flooding in London. In Scotland most of the trains had been cancelled during the day and many of the schools and colleges were closed. Made me realise the inconvenience of traveling all day wasn’t so bad after all, at least I arrived home safe unlike that poor truck driver who died in the storm .
As you can imagine, today has been a rest day. I ventured out at about 3.30, just to take a walk and get some exercise. So glad I did because it was high tide, I think it was the tail end of the storm. The waves were spectacular; I even managed a few photos.

Over the next few days I’m going to print off my Christmas cards and hopefully get them posted. If I have your address and I’ve sent you a card in the past, chances are you’ll get another this year. I’m printing off cards with my paintings on; if I don’t have your address and you would like one, just let me know, my email address is on my profile. And my next task here, is to respond to every one who has left comments, it may take me a while, but I’ll get round to every one eventually. These are my paintings I've chosen to use on my Christmas cards this year. .

 
  
 

This song was going round and round my head all day yesterday in the coach.