Creativity, art, music, might feel a world away from the very brutal realities of war: mud, death, rubble, bomb craters. 80 years on from VE Day, which saw many countries emerge from World War Two, this week has seen crowds gather once more to commemorate and to celebrate. Those six long years of war areContinue reading “A Past That Endures”
Category Archives: Music, Art, Nature, Wellbeing
Release
Yes, it’s starting to look – and sound – a lot like Christmas. To me, what sums up Christmas more than anything is festive music, however early it starts. Carols and classics like Fairytales of New York are on the radio, while in the shops, as someone quipped to me the other day, “Mariah Carey’sContinue reading “Release”
Reinventing Community
This week I saw images online of a wonderful creative display in a Midlands town to mark Remembrance Day. Local crafters came together to yarn bomb the high street, crocheting poppy themed toppers for the postboxes and making a large fabric collage scene as a wall hanging. Creativity at its best – enhancing the communityContinue reading “Reinventing Community”
Growing Old Creatively
Living in the moment can be one of the arts’ best gifts, lifting us out of the everyday and out of the wider picture. Maybe this is all the more important in older age, opening up space to imagine, to enjoy, to create, to produce or just to be. Silver Sunday ( the first SundayContinue reading “Growing Old Creatively”
Sketching Nature
On the very first day of meteorological autumn, as it is now called, I saw a cranefly – or daddy long legs – bumbling along the back wall of my house, up and down and across. Always a sign that autumn is on its way, and a sighting I’ll record on a page in myContinue reading “Sketching Nature”
On Prescription
Now that social prescribing has become a familiar term, it is easy to forget that just a few years ago prescribing was still all about medicine and pharmacies. Maybe more than anything else, social prescribing embodies a gradual move to more preventative healthcare and healthcare going beyond the immediate and beyond the physical. When socialContinue reading “On Prescription”
Deeper Than Words
Trauma has so many different roots and forms. Looking up synonyms for trauma, I found words like pain, damage, disturbance, hurt, scars, wounds and shock. Some people will retreat inwards, into silence. Others will want to talk, to emote. Some will experience trauma bonds, wanting to relive what happened. I recently read about the experiencesContinue reading “Deeper Than Words”
Concrete Cows
A few years ago I heard about Providence Youth Club in Battersea, London, welcoming a group of farm animals from The Shallowford Trust’s Dartmoor farm to a local city carpark for a week. Londoners could come to see the calves, lambs and pigs in the straw in pens just across the street from shops andContinue reading “Concrete Cows”
Endless Possibility
In my house sits an old guitar, unused for many years. Sometimes I’ve wondered about learning to play, but still haven’t taken the plunge. All I remember about the one and only time I went to a guitar class (at a music club for young people, when I was about 12), was all the talkContinue reading “Endless Possibility”
Day By Day
Are you a creature of habit? I know I am. I do like to be spontaneous too and to try different things, but I find that life works better if I follow a routine. Working for myself from home that’s particularly important – but in other parts of my life as well, routine really helps.Continue reading “Day By Day”
Medley 