Goodbye Summer

The Japanese summer departed swiftly leaving me rather surprised and clutching at my winter coats. Unlike New Zealand where the weather dilly dallies between seasons Japan is all about the sharp and defined change of the seasons. I'm now dreading seeing Australian and New Zealand friends popping up in my news feed, bathed in light and leisurely sipping on wine. Ahh the envy. I'm a summer kid! That said, here are some snaps taken over the past few weeks.

Doris

It's one year today since my Grandma passed away. I can hardly believe it. Instead of feeling sad I'm channeling my energy into thinking about the things I loved about my Grandma:

 -Her evening jumper selection that were bejeweled and embroidered for special nights when her and her husband went dancing

-The softness of her cheeks. They felt like silk, and smelt like lavender

-Her handwriting. The most beautiful I had ever seen

The things she made. Doilies, needlepoint masterpieces and long knitted scarves. Every piece she made was loaded with time and love

-Her ability to make killer pavlova

-The house she lived in; filled with antiques, trinkets and photographs

-Her collection of diamond rings, 5 stacked on each finger. Her hands were bedazzling

-The fact that she wasn't like most Grandmother's. She was very subdued with her emotions and affection, meaning a hug was incredibly significant. On my last visit she asked me for a kiss on the cheek. It was our way of knowing it was the last time we would see each other. I feel so lucky I got to say goodbye.

Oh the angst

At school I was definitely a geek. Frizzy hair, pimples, braces and an awkward lankiness were all part of my aesthetic. I didn't fit in with the wallflowers or academics so instead developed smart arse repartees to try and combat those who were better looking than I. Sometimes I stuck fridget magnets to my braces to get a laugh, but in reality it was pretty dire times. 

My staple outfit consisted of a black turtleneck, faded stonewashed bootleg jeans and leather lace ups. I knew what I liked but was worried I would look too ugly/silly if I tried to pull something off that was 'fash-un'. The group of girls I hung out with were good looking and popular so on Friday nights boys would ring me up to ask whether particular girls were interested. It was so depressing.  

I was totally and completely in love with the art teachers son and would create intricately detailed fantasies in my mind about the two of us doing something mundane, like walking through the supermarket car park together. Through some minor miracle he became my first boyfriend and briefly, I was the happiest girl on earth. One evening I snuck down my long driveway to find him waiting for me, beer can in hand, ready to kiss me. 

It was a first lip lock for both of us and afterwards I lay awake shaking in excitement replaying the strange memory of a tongue in my mouth. Three days after the spectacular kiss he dumped me at a friends party, on a trampoline. I was devastated to discover he liked a much prettier geek who he started dating. I cried until my eyes were red and hazy and refused to eat dinner. 

In the following years I would act out in rebellion to try and gain popularity which lead to my exile to a posh English style boarding school courtesy of my worried parents. The girls at the school heard a rumor that I was a half Mexican half Spanish drug dealer and no one really talked to me for the first term for fear I would offer them cocaine.

Being a teen was hard. All the soul searching and angst is at times too much to take on and although most teenagers (me) can be self involved and inconsiderate,  it would have been good to know that I didn't need to worry that these weren't the best years of my life and eventually the awkward self loathing would pass. Ahh, the beauty of hindsight.

My dedication list of TV shows and movies that gives me sweet sweet nostalgia about being a teen.

Freaks and Geeks

My So Called Life

The Wonder Years

Ghost World

Virgin Suicides

An Education

Pretty in Pink

Kids

The Wackness

Welcome to the Dollhouse

Sweet Sixteen

Ferris Bueller's day off

Mystic Pizza

Dazed and Confused

American Beauty

Our lady

I was raised in a devoutly catholic house. Crucifixes, rosary beads and mournful looking Marys were in abundance. My mother prayed solemnly every night and Sundays were always dedicated to church. 

When I was 14 my mother and I travelled to India and made a pilgrimage all the way to the Bay of Bengal. A large church had been built in a small town called Vailankanni after three miraculous sightings of Mary. It was a really crazy experience and I saw some unforgettable things; people kneeling on nails, old men offering to pray for my soul and choruses of people worshipping, wailing and singing.

I stopped believing in any form of religion when I was 12 but the love of religious paraphernalia has remained, particularly for Mary. I find something comforting in it, mostly it just reminds me of Mum. In her room she has a wooden box beside her vanity filled with all things dear to her, pictures of Dad looking handsome in flares, my brother and I as kids, prayer cards, letters from her mother and rosary beads galore. Whenever I go home I love touching the ornate wooden box and looking at her most prized and intimate items.

Now whenever friends see a particularly kitsch looking Mary they are usually kind enough to send it my way. Over the years I have built up quite a collection. To a stranger my home might look like that of a fanatic! 

Pictured above from the top, a postcard I received in the mail this week from a Japanese friend, a prayer card from Ireland, two Marys I picked up in my Mums hometown now at home amongst my makeup, a gifted pendant, two pages from a pilgrim prayer book that my Mum gave me when I left for Japan.

D.I.Y wrap

Yesterday I received my Hello Sandwich gift wrapping zine in the post which is VERY exciting. It is filled with fun D.I.Y projects for wrapping up gifts for all the special people in your life. I am a firm believer that a beautifully wrapped gift is so much more exciting to give and receive. When I was younger one of my presents under the Christmas tree looked so unbelievably exciting that after pacing around it for a good while I committed the most terrible crime, I opened my gift before Christmas! Of course this was immediately followed with feelings of remorse, and then intense fear about what my parents would do when they found out. I tried to wrap it back up but it was a complete disaster with bits of ripped paper and haphazard cellotape. Needless to say Mum and Dad were very unimpressed and there was no biscuits in my lunchbox for quite some time!

Fish curry

My bedroom at my parents house has pink fluffy and white clouds, a hand picked wrought iron bedhead and an aqua marine themed bedspread complete with starfish and dolphins. My mum has a bedazzling indian rug thrown over the bedspread in an attempt to make things look better. Alas, it actually looked worse. An ex boyfriend visiting my house told me, as we lay amongst splashing dolphins and hot fuchsia and mustard indian beading, that it was like lying in a fish curry.

 In terms of interior decoration I had somewhat appalling taste. The finished product is mortifying. I painted a beautiful off white chest of draws a hideous shade of teal, ruining it forever and there are fairy figurines and crystals that litter my window sill. Back issues of Dolly and Girlfriend stack my shelves alongside cassettes of the Commitments, Spin Doctors and Mariah Carey. Despite all my horrific shortcomings I have left my bedroom stuck in a time warp because I love returning home and staring at pictures of Jonathan Taylor Thomas, lying on my fish curry bed and rereading diary entries of torment, self doubt, awe and wonder.

Hospital visits

I hate hospitals. Sea foam green walls and an antiseptic smell reminds me that death and illness happens to everyone. All the flowers in the world can’t change that.

When my brother was younger he got very sick and so my family made frequent trips to see him. He was on a nutrient drip and couldn’t ingest food so he soon became a skeletal like figure lying in the bed, looking around despondently, and never complaining. Looking at him made the lump in my throat throb and swallowing was the only way to prevent tears.

The man opposite us was old and I never saw his family visit. One day as we sat with my brother the doctors came to see him, drawing the curtains quickly and telling him in unemotional voices that his operation had been unsuccessful and he had a few weeks. Hearing quiet sobs behind opaque curtains was brutal, sad and awkward. My family sat in silence looking at the hard lino floors for a long time. I couldn’t shake the thought that people are in the hospital 365 days of the year and this was not just a temporary visiting ground.

At Christmas time my brother was released from the hospital and we went to the beach. As he put on his wetsuit I noticed how his long and gangly his legs were, like a parisian supermodel. There was something oddly beautiful about it and I felt so happy he was alive.

Science appreciation

I love scientific illustrations. There is such a wealth of drawings, garage sales are sometimes a gold mine. I was no good at science in school. My teacher was very brilliant but got frustrated when I couldn't understand something. She yelled a lot. After 16 I shunned any interest in science forever.

My boyfriends Dad is both a very interesting man and a scientist. He knows about krill and barnacles and things I didn't know even existed. He even named a crustacean after his wife.  What I like the most is how passionate he is about his work. It's quite inspirational and makes me wonder what on earth I am doing. I appreciate so many things but when I go to take a tentative step in one direction my efforts are shaky and I feel like scratching them out before I have even begun. I guess you just have to be brave and say 'yes this is what I'm doing and even if I fail I really love it so that's that. The end.'

Ballet ghosts

Whilst conducting a much needed clean up of my beloved mac, I stumbled across these photos I took one sunday morning circa 2007 experimenting with my dirty digital camera.

little room

“Everyone of us is losing something precious to us. Lost opportunities, lost possibilities, feelings we can never get back again. That’s part of what it means to be alive. But inside our heads—at least that’s where I imagine it—there’s a little room where we store those memories. A room like the stacks in this library. And to understand the workings of our own heart we have to keep on making new reference cards. We have to dust things off every once in a while, let in fresh air, change the water in the flower vases. In other words, you’ll live forever in your own little private library.”

—	Haruki Murakami