Weather Diary - Day 22 (Monday April 10 2006 Sunny 62F)

'On The Sky'

"Shine through the gloom and point me to the skies..."
- Henry Francis Lyte 

The Sunday service at the Ocracoke United Methodist Church has travelled with me into Monday. Or, rather, the ringing sound of the hymns.
It is a perfect sun-filled morning, and I am humming
'Abide With Me'.
Humming, (rather than singing), as I don't really know the words, but I love it in all of its old-fashioned glory, and the way it makes the tears (involuntarily) well up in my eyes.
Wasn't it one of the last songs played on the Titanic?
The phrase which stays with me, '...point me to the skies...', has (in my humming version), become the only spoken part of every verse.
And so, with this phrase nailed in my brain, I decide to 'up sticks' (at least for the morning) and travel to one of Ocracoke's far-flung beaches with Chester, a box of watercolours and a sketchbook.
And, in so doing, point myself to the skies.

We drive through the village, (stopping for a moment at the coffee shop), and then along the Back Road, Old Beach Road, curving past houses, stunted village trees, jungly undergrowth full of bird song. And on past the Ocracoke Child Care, ('Peace begins in the playground'), turning onto Highway 12. We creep along at 'village speed', passing the main grocery/hardware store, U.S. Post Office, Sheriff's Office,  Howard's Pub and the South Point Road, to the outer reaches where we can finally step on it, on the open two-lane highway stretching up the island.

It feels a bit like escaping. Not that I don't absolutely love the little village of Ocracoke,
but here, when you 'head out on the highway', you are (typically) on your own.
On we drive, past the little airport, the 'lifeguard' beach (with no lifeguard at this time of year), Hammock Hills nature trail, NPS campground, pony pasture, and on to (what we call) the 'North Beach'.

There are, in actual fact, two vehicles already parked in the sandy little pull-off. Chester leads me up the high dunes, (in his eagerness to run wild and free on the beach), but we stop at the top to take it all in. The view, that is.
Oh my my.
This first glimpse (of the day) of the wide open Atlantic never fails to impress.
It is all so extraordinarily beautiful.

I spot the people belonging to the vehicles - a couple, surf-fishing 100 yards one way, and a dad with two kids shelling in the other direction. Chester, unleashed, sniffs his way to a dead something and has a happy roll in it, all four legs in the air.
I set up camp. Paints, pencils, ruler, brushes, water-bottle, sketch pad, folded hoodie to sit on, and (very naughtily) one can of icy cold beer, to bury in the sand until 11 a.m.

As awe-inspiring as the sea is, the sky is a pretty equal match.
And, happily, if I were to choose one day for sky-study, this is a good one.
The first thing that strikes me is colour.  Do I have the right ones in this little paint box to capture it all?
I decide to work in a grid-like manner, drawing a series of small squares on several pages. Now I can systematically record the subtle nuances, and at the same time create (what I consider to be) a pleasing pattern.
But it isn't as easy as it seems.
The sky, blues moving into lighter blues, into greys, into whites.
The paints, though, (in a lovely wooden box inherited from a favourite Renouf relative), are up to the task. I begin with a range of blues, greys, earthy greens and browns. I mix, add water, more colour, and do my darnedest to capture what I see.
The wind, scuttling cloud, swiftly moving shadow, sparkling sunlight, reflecting and effecting the colour of the energetic constantly moving sea.
I include the vivid hues of the sea in my sky studies, (and a fair bit of the ubiquitous sand,
blowing about and ending up as part of the art). Not sure I've really captured the colours, but happy with the process.

And so it goes, until Chester nudges my arm and I see his lolling tongue.
Thirsty.
We each have our drinks of choice, (so good) and then a long long bare-footed amble in the shallows of the ebbing sea.

Later, back in the cottage, (feeling somewhat sunned-out), I read, lying on a sofa cushion on the floor of the shady screened porch, "Hawthorne on Painting". His words speak to me.

"Get acquainted with your palette, dip into pans that you almost know won't do. Experiment."

"Each day has its own individuality of colour."

"Have the humble attitude. To see things simply is the hardest thing in the world."

"As long as one is simple and childlike and humble, one progresses. Keep this point of view and there is no limit."

"Irritatingly correct - charmingly incorrect."

That's it, isn't it. The truth about all things interesting in art. That the work be 'charmingly incorrect'.
Not duplicated accurately.
Nor copied mindlessly.
Nor fiddled with endlessly.
But observed, touched, tasted, with all our human foibles and imperfections.
Point me to the skies and I'll show you what I see.

Weather Diary - Day 21 (Sunday April 9 2006 Sun & Wind 55F)

'On Loss'

Sunday. Sun and wind.
And all I can think of is the fact that this day marks the start of my last week of self-inflicted hermit's pilgrimage.
This makes me a bit sad.
Yes, I still have a week on my own, to finish the artwork I need to finish. And it's really not unmanageable or overwhelming, (in spite of my panic of yesterday). I just feel a bit sad that this time, a time of my own rhythm, is coming to an end.
My rhythm.
So like the tides, I move toward my work, and step back. Toward and back. Toward and back.

Leaving Chester at home, I hike over to the Ocracoke United Methodist Church for some spiritual nourishment.
First I hear, rather than see, the activity around the church. There is an abundance of children, some running around outside, others standing on the steps handing out bulletins. I enter and settle into a pew, happy to be anonymous. There is plenty to watch as families, singles, friends, young and old, make their way in. I sit behind (what I imagine to be) a mother and daughter, one in her 70's, the other 40-ish.
It seems somehow so familiar, this mother and daughter. One speaks quietly, the other leans towards her, smiling. Both comfortable and content in each other's company. So lovely.
The mother reaches into her purse, fishes around for something, and hands it to the daughter. The daughter stares at the 'something' in her lap. Their eyes meet and hold for a moment. Then both are consumed by silent giggles.
Yes, somehow so familiar.

 I feel a stab of wistful memory, seated behind this mother and daughter in the Ocracoke United Methodist Church. My mother and I spent Sunday mornings in a similar fashion the last years of her life. The last years of her life, and our closest.
I loved my mother dearly, and counted on her for so much, but we both shared argumentative natures, natures which led us up a sometimes rocky path, (though always ending in peace.)
"You and mum are SO alike." My sister's pronouncement to me as a teenager.
And true.
We, at times, rubbed against each other, each knowing the other's argument inside out and backwards (because we'd heard it all before).
But my sister also confided in me her prediction that I'd probably end up closest to our mother.
True? Perhaps.
In her last years, all was loving friendship, and peace.
Peace.
The name my mother is very nearly given, being born two days before the end of the first World War, a name, by her own admission, totally inappropriate. Born on the island of Jersey, Esme, the youngest, much loved and cherished child. Here they live until 1940 when their lives are turned upside down. They leave Jersey on the last boat to England the day before the German occupation of the Channel Islands begins. Her mother, frail, her father, vacillating about leaving, her sister with two small children, and my mother.  Each with one small bag, leaving everything else behind.

My mother, a wonderful story teller and writer, takes it from here:

"When we arrived in Weymouth, (on the south coast of England), we had no idea where we were going to go. My father announced that he was just going to slip away to do a bit of shopping. Leaving the rest of us puzzled and tired, we couldn't imagine what this man, who rarely shopped for himself, needed. He returned an hour later, looking sheepish. In a brown paper parcel was a pair of men's pyjamas. The reason given, that he's forgotten to pack any. As in his one small case (allowed for each person), he had packed the following:
his dinner jacket,
a bottle of scotch,
and a glass."

My mother's parents, my grandparents, never return to their beloved island. Both die in wartime in Shrewsbury, England. My mother marries my father, and when the war is over, and life slowly, imperceptibly begins to return to normal, they, along with my two eldest brothers, immigrate to Canada.
My mother. Bright, sociable, deeply spiritual, funny, argumentative, comforting, loving. A voracious reader, a writer whose craft never really gets the recognition I wish it had. Is this due to her choices, her family, her charitable work? Was this a loss for her?

The service at the Ocracoke United Methodist Church, is lengthy. Each person there for their own reasons. My mother, on my mind throughout. So thankful am I that her life didn't end when I was a selfish child, a belligerent teenager, a needy young adult.
That would be loss for me on a massive scale.
So thankful am I that she lived to an age when we could sit in loving friendship, comfortable and content in each other's company, like the mother and daughter in the pew in front of me, on this windy sunny Sunday morning, in the Ocracoke United Methodist Church.

Weather Diary - Day 20 (Saturday April 8 2006 Sun Cloud Wind 70F)

'On Memory'

Another glorious Spring (more like Summer) day on Ocracoke Island.
I am set, on this Saturday morning, (a morning spreading its pale yellow light throughout the cottage), to knuckle down to work. Well equipped with supplies, (both of the edible and art variety), I needn't venture far this morning, at least no farther than our little jungly back yard for Chester's purposes.
I am feeling a sense of frantic need, as there is so much I want to explore, art-wise, while I am here on this island on my own. The time is sifting away, like a handful of beach sand, and still so much to do.
Nothing like getting down to some good hard work.
Good. Hard. Work.
Ha.
I am muttering it aloud to make it so. But the words are my father's words, as it was he who's use of that expression, (usually to get someone's help in the garden), was frequent.

I search through my art inspiration brought from home - photos, drawings, paper scraps, postcards, torn out magazine images. Some, fluttering on my fishing-net covered window, some in a box at my feet.
And then I come across what I am looking for. A few small pencil and watercolour sketches, done by my father.

It is nearly thirteen years since my father died.

His sketches, (all of ships), are quick but accurate. They are done with love, with a hand that knows exactly what it wants to put down. They are done by a deft hand, (and left hand, for that matter, in spite of his being right-handed), a hand that studies and draws ships its entire life. These drawings show ships from port and starboard views, bow and stern, in calm seas or heeling slightly in a stiff wind, both at sea and safe at harbour. They are drawn by someone who knows what they are talking about.
Someone who knows ships. That's the story these drawings tell.

My father's ability to recall minute detail is legendary. All of my life, I hear him relate memories from childhood, babyhood even. Born during the first World War, his is an unusual childhood. Full of love, yes, but unusual from a 21st century point of view. (And full of sea voyages.) A Channel Islander, a Jerseyman by heritage, (Jersey being one in the cluster of tiny islands between England and France), but born in New York City, and sent to school in England at the age of eight. There he lives with his maternal grandparents while attending Colet Court, (the prep school for St. Paul's), and later Victoria College, Jersey, when his father and mother return from the U.S. after the 1929 crash. He receives the Charles the First Scholarship to Oxford, and dreams of studying history, but, being an only child and having many hopes pinned on him, he attends Oxford to study law. His mother, my grandmother, Florence Eugenie Luce Renouf, dies suddenly just after my father's 20th birthday.
What I know about this event, is little. What I sense, is huge.
My father, who I believe had a deep and loving connection with his mother, must have been shattered by this.
Oxford.  World War Two.  Royal Navy.
Ships.
Wartime. Seemingly endless separations from his sweetheart (my mother), terrifying convoys, long stretches of mind-numbing routine.
Being interested in family history, I, (usually with a box of photos between us), wheedle info out of him throughout my childhood and teens.  Mainly stories of growing up in New York, Oxford, the war, my parent's war-time wedding, their move to Canada, our 16 months in New Zealand.
He was a gentleman and a gentle man, my father. Avid reader. Keen gardener. Lover of ships and the sea.

Chester senses a change in plan as I gather up leash, keys, purse. The 'good hard work' can wait another hour.
At this moment, I am in need of the sea.

Weather Diary - Day 19 (Friday April 7 2006 Sun Cloud Wind 80F)

'On Creativity'

I am dreaming in red.

I'm actually dreaming of fire, a red crackling campfire, a campfire of leaping sparks, surrounded by darkness. I feel a deep luscious sense of contentment. All is tinged with red. Warm and comforting.
And when the buzzing drone of an insect breaks the spell, I open my eyes only to see a pinkish glow enveloping my room, the first tinted light of day.

It is 7 a.m. and I have slept in.

It is the first time in nineteen days that I have slept past 5, and I (despite
breaking the morning ritual) am elated.
Before my morning tea, before spiritual reading, moments of meditative silence, plans for the day,
artwork, food, radio, domestic chores, before anything else happens, I pull on some clothes (where they lay from last night), rouse Chester and head out into the day.

Everything is sharp and bright. (Is it me or my mood or the weather?) Everything seems fresh and twinkly with tiny dew drops and dancing light. Chester is feeling it too, so we ramble onward through the village, cutting through the (still quiet) school yard, and up deserted Howard Street.  Howard Street, (more of a footpath, really, but in actual fact a one-way road), with the leaves of the ancient live oak trees rustling and flickering with light.
Past small family burial plots, the slanting light illuminating shaded mossy stones, ('loving father', 'dear sister of', 'rest in peace'), past the front-porch dogs, barking in frenzy but keeping a distance, and then out of this cool light onto the circling harbour road, where things are slightly more active.
We keep to the road's edge, but are passed by only two vehicles, pick-up trucks, each one turning onto the British Cemetery Road, (heading for the coffee shop?), and one with an old yellow lab in the back staring balefully at Chester but passing without comment.

And on we walk past the ferry docks, across to the NPS shop, the little patch of woods behind, the wide expanse of grass, parking lot, public boat launch, a glimpse of Pamlico Sound, the David Williams House, (the museum run by the Ocracoke Preservation Society), and on to the road where the two trucks turned. When we arrive at the coffee shop fifteen minutes later, sure enough, the two trucks are there, the old yellow lab waiting patiently for his human.
Once coffeed, and deciding that I am in need of some new drawing materials, (reds primarily), we make our way to the little book shop which (happily) has a small section of art supplies. As Chester lies on the bookshop porch, I chat and choose a beautiful set of French oil pastels. Thus armed, I am ready for home and the creative part of the day.
The creative part of the day.
What is it about that? Doesn't this part of the day count as 'creative'? Surely my day is already packed with all things creative - sights, sounds, scents, tastes - but I practically disregard it all in the rush to get to my drawing table. Shouldn't all of  it count as 'creative'?
Can these perceptions - sights, sounds, scents, tastes - be useful in creating something new?
Whatever the answer, I do know one thing.
I am all about the 'process'.
Which, in actual fact, covers a lot of ground. My being here, after all, is part of the 'process'.
Process -  the course of becoming.
Exploring, experimenting, (sometimes disastrously), but moving. Moving beyond, taking things further, where even the disasters play a part in the new creation.
That is what excites me, and what allows for freedom to explore ideas, concepts, materials. Because if even the disasters have a role in what is to come, (creatively speaking), I am completely free to play around with ideas and concepts and materials, and be influenced by sights, sounds, scents, tastes, without any inhibitions.
Is that the secret to creativity?

The day turns hot (but breezy), and up in our little sanctuary of creativity, both dog and explorer are happy. One in a shady spot on the deck, and the other in a shady spot on the deck, with a small round table at which to work and a beautiful new French oil pastel set.
And lots of reds.

Weather Diary - Day 18 (Thursday April 6 2006 Partly Cloudy 64F)

'On Friendship'

When I finish my current 'page-turner', I celebrate by hunkering down and getting on with it.
It is absolutely time to
Get. To. Work.

Artwork that is.
Here is where I stand on Day 18:

• The works on 24" x 36" panels are progressing well. 
• My self-portrait at age twelve, is coming along beautifully. 
• I have two (quite successful) watercolours for our hotel-owning friends (So far... working on number three.)
• I am completely and utterly faithful to my evening drawing, (10" x 10" oil pastel and graphite abstract landscapes, seventeen and counting.)
• A small pad full of notes, colour studies, sketches of the sea, comes with me everywhere.
• I  have (at least) half a dozen women's basketball games under my belt.

Oh, wait a minute. (Did I say that out loud?)

A guilty secret, but true. I am still on a high after the NCAA 2006 women's basketball final of Tuesday night. (Maryland Terrapins 78, Duke Blue Devils 75)
A basketball game of such skill that it really makes little sense to point out that it is women's basketball. They are, quite simply, incredibly good basketball players. And the joy for me is that I can watch it! As they actually show such things here in North Carolina!!
I do feel a (wee) bit guilty.
Here I am on my 'self-inflicted hermit's pilgrimage', spending the days beginning at 5 a.m., with spiritual reading, art, contemplative walks and sea study. And here I am spending the evenings in front of a 36" TV, perched on the edge of the sofa, clutching a beer.
Doesn't quite fit the image.
Even so, I like this time to myself, for myself. It is my 'kick-back' time, after all.
I am an enthusiastic retired basketball player, (University of Toronto, Scarborough College 1975-78). Thirty years ago.
Ew.
But I can relate to, well, to the extreme closeness and friendship that this level of competition brings out.
And these gals are close. Oh my, they are tight buds. Yes yes, they are a well-oiled machine, excellently coached, highly skilled and trained on plays, (so much so that they could run them in their sleep). But also this.
They clearly clearly care deeply for each other.
And I find myself wondering, "Is this a girl thing?"

Because if nothing else, if I take away nothing else from my basketball playing days of the mid-70's, friend-wise, it is a glorious golden time in my life.
There are four of us.
(There are, of course, others team members, and each year we do have strong ties that bind the team together.)
But the four of us are inseparable. And dedicated.
Dedicated to the point of knowing each others moves, thoughts, reactions.
We master silent communication.
We practice together daily. We hang out together. Go everywhere together. We play together.
We win.
I can't help but wonder if it is friendship that makes things work for us.
The fact that we do anything for each other, that we care what happens, that we love each other.
Doesn't that count for something?
And yes, we all have other friends. Childhood neighbours, school mates, camp friends. But with the four of us, it is as though we have been through something together. Something big. Like people who cling to each other through a crisis and have that extra perception, that tie, that memory, forever after.

It is a strikingly beautiful day on Ocracoke Island. For Chester and me, perfect conditions to walk the beach and study the sea.
The sea, a deep blue-green, the clouds scuttling across the open sky. I think of my basketball friends, all far away. We do still keep in touch, (although there are often longish gaps), and there is still love, the kind of love that has softened and faded with the passage of time and changing circumstances. But it is love, this deep binding friendship.

Chester and I have an hour on the beach, marching its empty length. I, in the frilly rippling shallows, he, nosing around the base of the dunes, matching me stride for stride, (unless he finds something 'interesting'). On the way home, we pass the coffee shop, the library (both closed), the one and only Ocracoke school (finished for the day), the outdoor basketball court (with a single orange basketball sitting under one net).
No one about, and a single orange basketball sitting under one net.
As Chester lies in the cool grass, I (at first disastrously - so badly that I am grateful there is no one about), shoot baskets. But gradually gradually, it comes back, and after fifteen minutes, (due more to luck than skill), I sink a hook shot which is, for this fifty year old, enough.
And we head for home.

Weather Diary - Day 17 (Wednesday April 5 2006 Sun 68F)

'On Home'

Why am I always starving on Wednesdays?

Perhaps it is because I know that the Vegetable Man comes to Ocracoke today, and will be setting up his booth of oh-so-delicious fresh fruit and veggies this very morning. Or perhaps it is a mid-week growth spurt of sorts. Whatever the reason, I begin the (eating part of the) day with a bowl of 'grits'.
For anyone new to this, grits are a real Southern food experience. I have taken to them in a big way. They are comfort food, 'suth-un stahl', but such a versatile food that grits can be eaten with any meal, at any time of day. For me, though, grits are for breakfast. A bit like cream of wheat, but more pebbly and corny. If ordered in a restaurant, grits will arrive with what looks and tastes like a pool of melted margarine on top of the white mound.
More appealing to me is a pool of maple syrup, (sort of north-meets-south in a bowl), and a splash of milk, just like having oatmeal or Red River cereal or cream of wheat back home.

Home.

The maple syrup is making me wistful.
Don't get me wrong. I'm happy that I have brought along my litre bottle of the delicious nectar.
But the taste. Oh my.
I dip out a teaspoonful of syrup, (Chester riveted, watching every move), pop the spoon in my mouth, close my eyes, slowly savour the flavour, roll it over my tongue.
I am back in Ontario in an instant.

It is a crisp spring day. The kind of day when you are too hot in winter garb, and too cool without. It is the kind of day for hoodies, bulky sweaters, mitts and toques. When there is still snow in the woods, and you need to keep moving to stay warm if you are not within a foot of the fire.
I am gathering sap, (at least, the buckets within about twenty paces of the sugar-house), and every ten minutes of so, feeding wood into the evaporator.
Doug is way way off in the easternmost part of the woods, and I can just hear the distant clang of the buckets as he replaces each one on its spile. The snow is still deep enough that you can follow the footprints from the previous day's gathering, like a treasure hunt taking you from tree to tree.
When the fire is good and hot and the sap is boiling hard in the pans, the air becomes sweet and moist, combining with woodsmoke and the scents of early spring in Ontario.
Scents of melting snow, and thawing earth, of rotting leaves and wood, and the first minute green shoots pushing skyward in dappled patches of sun.

So here I sit on Ocracoke Island, in the brightening morning of another blissfully warm southern summer-like day, thinking, (when I should be making art), of home, my beloved woods, my boy. And in spite of being in a t-shirt, denim skirt, flip-flops, in sun and heat and buzzing insects, contentedly enfolded in this place, I do miss home, and that slow gradual almost imperceptible shift into Spring which defines the North.

Chester and I decide that there is just time for one more bowl of grits and maple syrup before we see the Vegetable Man, and then, finally, settle down to work.

Weather Diary - Day 16 ( Tuesday April 4 2006 Sunny and Windy 64F)

'On Reading'

I'm so totally into my book.

I have spent over two weeks now honing and perfecting the best way to make use of the hours in my day.
My daily rhythm, that is, while on this art pilgrimage on Ocracoke Island.
But it is, after all, designed to suit my own interests, and be to my own satisfaction, so if I stray sometimes from its structure, that is okay by me.
That is, except for my one-a-day evening drawing. On this I keep firm control.
It must be done.  On. The. Day.

So here I sit at ten in the morning,
enveloped in the comfort of reading.

I keep up my regime of early morning spiritual reading. It is, I think, just about the perfect way to start the day. (Once the tea is made.) And the term 'spiritual' is proving to be fairly flexible. (Flexible to the extent of including, on this pilgrimage, just about everything I have brought with me.)
So, that includes writings poetic, inspirational, reflective, sensitive, artistic.
And, well, maybe stretch just a wee bit further.

And so, I read:

'The Cloister Walk' by Kathleen Norris.
'Beyond the Walls' by Paul Wilkes.
'Pilgrim at Tinker Creek' by Annie Dillard.
'The Pocket Aquinas'
The Psalms

And regularly dip into:

'The Penguin Book of Canadian Verse' (edited by Ralph Gustafson)
'Donne' (poems selected and edited by John Hayward)
'Search for the Real' by Hans Hofmann
'Hawthorne on Painting' (collected by Mrs. C.W. Hawthorne)
'Sara Midda's South of France'

And here's the stretch:

'The Shell Seekers' by Rosamunde Pilcher
'Sense and Sensibility' by Jane Austen
'Q's Legacy' by Helene Hanff
'Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince' by J.K. Rowling
(purchased at the lovely little Ocracoke bookshop)
'Swallows and Amazons' by Arthur Ransome

But it is the last of these that has me in its grip right at this moment.
I am betraying my art. I am being unfaithful to my purpose for being here.
But I do it out of love.
I am in love with a place and time, with an island, (Wild Cat Island), with its inhabitants, (the crew of the Swallow), and their invaders, (the 'Amazon' pirates).
I can't put this book down until I know if they, (the Swallows), are very nearly duffers. Or not.
(Read book to understand.)
So I read, and console myself with the fact that my 'spiritual' reading does at least involve water and an island, and decisions, and conscience and love.
And it is, oh so nice, to lie in a sunny sheltered spot, (without fear of tornadoes or tidal waves or earthquakes), and read.