It’s been a quietly special time here in Los Angeles, punctuated yesterday by a trip to the movies to see A Complete Unknown.
It’s Thanksgiving Day here in the USA. I sit in our tiny garden spilling over with flowers and watch the hummingbirds hovering on their jewelled wings of speed.
Shifting sands move under our feet as we find ourselves back on the beach. The scene sharpens and we talk through the landscape of a gathering evening.
We flew home into the blue of beyond two weeks ago. In a few days we will catch a plane to the tomorrow of a southern French sun.
There’s a Bob Dylan song that‘s been rolling along the tracks of my mind for some time. Even now, as I’m walking on a slowly sunny Los Angeles afternoon with the hound, I can hear it.
I found myself on an eye wateringly early flight home to Los Angeles this morning after a wonderful few days in Mexico City.
It’s Thanksgiving Day here in the USA. I sit in our tiny garden spilling over with flowers and watch the hummingbirds hovering on their jewelled wings of speed.
Shifting sands move under our feet as we find ourselves back on the beach. The scene sharpens and we talk through the landscape of a gathering evening.
We flew home into the blue of beyond two weeks ago. In a few days we will catch a plane to the tomorrow of a southern French sun.
I found myself on an eye wateringly early flight home to Los Angeles this morning after a wonderful few days in Mexico City.
A velveteen rabbit lies abandoned on the bed. Sunday afternoon creeps quietly up through the open window.
We’ve come to the end of a busy week here. Lessons, activities and all manner of learning have flooded our tiny school.
It’s a blazingly hot Sunday afternoon here. Temperatures have rocketed up to 100 degrees and everybody’s feeling the heat.
It’s a cool grey morning. Hints of blue are emerging to push the clouds aside but the heat of the afternoon is for now a vague promise.
And so we’re back in the land of sunshine and disfunction. We flew home last weekend on a plane ride so bumpy in places that Mr Dylan himself might have had a thing or two to say about it!
Sitting in silent communion with the spirits of the Tazza Fountain in Hyde Park’s Italian Gardens I feel the magic of this particular spot once again.
It’s a bright and sun scorched morning as Duke and I step out on our usual outing through the neighbourhood.
Solitude has taken up residence in our dwelling in the precious minutes before the children and the hound are awake. My husband long ago drove off to work, leaving me free to wander through memory’s halls.
There have been days of overwhelming business of late, infused with that peculiarly American insatiability. It climbs right up inside your soul and grabs you by the throat, seemingly intent on stealing your last breath too.
The hound and I have been out and about this week. Temperatures soared once more. At times the light had a flat brightness that could cut glass.
We sit on the sand. The roaring wind muffles the rising curve of the ocean. She’s wrapped in a makeshift blanket fashioned out of a tiger towel.
It’s been a quietly special time here in Los Angeles, punctuated yesterday by a trip to the movies to see A Complete Unknown.
There’s a Bob Dylan song that‘s been rolling along the tracks of my mind for some time. Even now, as I’m walking on a slowly sunny Los Angeles afternoon with the hound, I can hear it.
I’m always on the look out for resonances which return me to the truth of the dream-like nature of our experience. It’s why I love Inception, Christopher Nolan’s exquisite creation from 2010.
It began with Keats. Walking through the enchanted world of Ode to a Nightingale I left the beaten track, mesmerized by a summons from the favorite American writer of my youth.
I spent a hot and tired hour crawling through Sunday afternoon traffic on the 405 today and experienced one of those rare moments of musical transcendence when the world fades away.
Through the quiet air of a family evening the songs from Rough and Rowdy Ways float from the stereo. We sit gathered together in the absence of our son who has departed for London Town.
Casting my mind back, one of my favourite early memories of Joe Ruggiero is from England in 2012. We were already seasoned US residents at that point, or so we thought.
I’m on the beach again with the ocean roaring in my ears. Today I hear darker voices calling through the sinew and muscle of the waves; I shiver as the cold water curls around my toes.
I’m teaching Virgil again. It‘s hard to believe that it’s been ten years since I last taught this greatest of poets. Although the school room has turned into a kitchen table and the student is my fifteen year old son rather than a group of girls from London,
We took that trip to see more of America. Early one morning we bundled into my husband’s car, children, bags, dog and all, leaving home in the rear view mirror, at least for a while.
In the current time of loss and shrinkage of our humanity, the song of the eternal poet has been stalking my thoughts. What does he make of our intrusive silence I often wonder.
I’ve been thinking about disillusionment recently.
This past week happened to mark the passage of ten years since my husband, son and I made our bold move across the Atlantic from London to New York.
As I sit in my chair and gaze outwards, night gradually spreads her primordial fingers across the sky. There are noises outside; tonight the neighbourhood crows have arrived, en masse it would seem.
In these long dog days of confinement, with life before a distant memory and life after an unknown, it is only when sitting beside the ocean that any clarity of thought returns to me. As I sit gazing silently through the waves I hear voices calling.