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FiftyFive ~ # 34
I wasn't going to do this posting today but my ancient cat has me at the kitchen table after letting her out then in then out then in then... but also because last night I was sent this wonderful picture, entitled, Balancing Act, and the title is as obvious as the delightful chaos around it. I really, really like this, its by Robert Juniper, who is a West Australian painter, who I am assured is a lovely man who is irredeemably drunk but can really paint, and he keeps the most beautiful Rhodesian Ridgebacks and likes to smoke a pipe outside over a little fire in the bush, and talk in a desultory fashion about colour theory and wine - which is just fine by me. Isn't it odd - and this is just an observation - but in the northern gemisphere (sic) we would just call him an Australian, but down there he is a Western Australian and that says much about the way we shorthand our way through life and indeed goes back to reacting to huge events - like hurricanes - when we should be more alert to the daily and finer details. Of course we would soon become overwhelmed by the minutia of life but it pays not to ignore it from time to time. And there is a wonderful section in Invisible Cities by my beloved Italo Calvino where he explains how a knot appeared in the wood of the chess board that Kubla Khan and Marco Polo are sitting at, and it is a metaphorical reference to look at life deeper than hitherto we have don - and I don't have a copy here (mine was destroyed by a satsuma) but one day I may transcribe it. But all remains to say, this is all for now, for I am off to the airport with A. who flies to Finland. But all men choose the path they walk...
I wasn't going to do this posting today but my ancient cat has me at the kitchen table after letting her out then in then out then in then... but also because last night I was sent this wonderful picture, entitled, Balancing Act, and the title is as obvious as the delightful chaos around it. I really, really like this, its by Robert Juniper, who is a West Australian painter, who I am assured is a lovely man who is irredeemably drunk but can really paint, and he keeps the most beautiful Rhodesian Ridgebacks and likes to smoke a pipe outside over a little fire in the bush, and talk in a desultory fashion about colour theory and wine - which is just fine by me. Isn't it odd - and this is just an observation - but in the northern gemisphere (sic) we would just call him an Australian, but down there he is a Western Australian and that says much about the way we shorthand our way through life and indeed goes back to reacting to huge events - like hurricanes - when we should be more alert to the daily and finer details. Of course we would soon become overwhelmed by the minutia of life but it pays not to ignore it from time to time. And there is a wonderful section in Invisible Cities by my beloved Italo Calvino where he explains how a knot appeared in the wood of the chess board that Kubla Khan and Marco Polo are sitting at, and it is a metaphorical reference to look at life deeper than hitherto we have don - and I don't have a copy here (mine was destroyed by a satsuma) but one day I may transcribe it. But all remains to say, this is all for now, for I am off to the airport with A. who flies to Finland. But all men choose the path they walk... 
