A-tidying I’ll go

Indeed, have gone! Our landlord’s coming tomorrow with plumber to do some repairs/improvements, and everything was such a mess that I really felt I needed to clear some stuff up, so I’ve done 2 loads of laundry, put away the clean sheets that were drifting about for ages, cleaned out the fridge, put out the rubbish, put on the dishwasher, tidied the remnant laundry which was flowing out of the basket and all over the floor and generally neatened things up. I even managed to clear out and get rid of another box. I know (like yesterday’s) that this isn’t hugely creative in a concrete sense, but for me being tidy is often a first step to getting my brain in the right place to actually do some work. So yay!

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Ah finances

Well, it may not be hugely creative but one thing’s for sure: getting one’s financial records up to date sure helps clear the brain to make way for more exciting stuff. Plus there’s the pleasure of ticking things off the to-do list and feeling super-organised!

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The Crash

I’d actually forgotten about this poor little blog. There’s just been so much going on over the past month – work, the piece for London New Wind Festival (stress and heartbreak over that one – more on that later, I suspect), my healing ankle (good news on that one, at least!), a week off frantically working on the piece, then frantically trying to get the house in order & achieve other chores before zooming off to Edinburgh to sample the Festival for a few brief days and go to a meeting in Dundee. And of course, while in Scotland I accidentally relaxed, and within 4 hours had the flu. Which I still have, a week and a half later.

So now I am at home, bored, frustrated and wanting to get things done but lacking the actual physical strength to do it. Every nap is plagued with hideous nightmares (this afternoon I was being chased at vast speed by an aggressive eagle, last night I woke whimpering at 3am thinking my legs were wound around with hundreds of red and black centipedes) which usually indicates that my creative brain is running and ready to go… except that I don’t have the strength to actually do very much.

So it’s been a tad on the frustrating side, really. And we’re nearing the end of August now. The piece is due in final form, with parts, on 1 September; on 21 September my parents arrive for 3 months and we all go to Paris for a week, which I’m quite looking forward to – when my brain lets go of the panic of all the pages and pages of things that need to be done before then – everything ranging from doing some handwashing (working out the best way to do handwashing in our new flat) to getting the landlord to take away the horrible lumpy bed in what will be the parents’ room to harassing Djelibeybi to organise a passport for Number One Son who is supposed to be coming to live with us next year. Not to mention getting back to my harmony studies, the Satie/Dada article, the web book, reworking my website and actually doing something about the many, many incomplete projects that are lying about the place…

Now I’m going to stop thinking about it and maybe go and do a little gentle baking, if the germ will let me stay standing for that long.

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Went for a long walk

at lunchtime, with a friend – the longest I’ve done since the accident – just over 4km!! I tested out the My Tracks application on my phone too – very cool! Showed where we’d been, how far it was, how long, how fast we walked – all sorts of things!

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Piece underway

Well, actually, it’s been underway for a while – I just haven’t been posting. Things got a little overwhelming there for a bit, culminating in the recent death of djelibeybi’s uncle, which rather hit me for six, but I’m gradually clawing back to what reality ought to be rather than what it actually is. The piece I’m working on is for 5 flexible wind instruments (flexible instrumentation, that is, not bendy flutes!) and piano, which I hope may prove suitable for this year’s London New Wind Festival. I’ve been reading a bunch of Kandinsky books for it, which have been mostly interesting (the beginning of Concerning the Spiritual in Art did seem to rather rate the term ‘twaddle’ though) – not entirely sure how they’re relating yet, if at all, but one has to start somewhere.

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Finished Art & Fear

For the second time. That’s one powerful book. It totally captures the wonder and massive insecurities of being an artist. I think this should be required reading for anyone who lives with an artist and isn’t one themselves. And even if they are, then I’d probably recommend it. I’m hoping to do a proper book review of it soon, but first need to sort out this house business first – putting in a lease application in the morning, then signing the lease probably on Thursday. Moving in about a month, it seems, so regular posting should hopefully resume after that.

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Actually cooked something

Yeah, it’s been a while, but I’m trying to get back to eating a bit more healthily, so I actually made an effort today and mixed up some red curry paste and then made a chicken curry – nice to eat a proper meal again!

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Had a lovely sociable afternoon

Met up with a friend in Notting Hill for the Grand National and a meal (it started out as being supposed to be brunch, but can it really be brunch at 5pm?) – we wandered around a bit and ended up playing Uno in a gelato shop. Totally revitalising

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Took some photos of the spring

Sudden Ealing nostalgia meets delight in new camera.

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Wrote a list of everything I’m trying to do

It filled a whole A4 page. Without really trying. Which is rather scary, I think. Conclusion: I’m expecting too much of myself, and because I’m too tired to be rational, I’m blaming others for not apparently putting in as much effort as I’d like them too (even though they have their own stuff going on). I think this has been useful. Unfortunately there’s very little I can ditch off the list right now, but at least now I have a better handle on why I’m falling apart so I can hopefully be a bit kinder to myself and a bit more forgiving of others. Or at least that’s the plan. Oh look – a plan. That’s another thing for the list. *sigh*

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