The banal best of 2018 ... so far

Oh my goodness! 
It's almost the end of February.
A sixth of the year has already passed. That's almost 17%... or 16.66666667% if you're a maths whizz ... or a dork.

I find myself wondering where the first two months of the year have gone.
And then I wonder if I've used the time wisely, or have I squandered it?
What have I achieved?

But as I reflect upon The Year So Far, mostly I find myself thinking of all the good things that have already come my way. 

No, I'm not getting all gushy about love and liberty. 
Sorry. It's far more banal than that.
I'm talking about the little things. 
The everyday morsels that make my heart sing.

Here goes: 

The Best of 2018 Thus Far


Best Garden Find
Pot plants.
At the top of the list.
Who would have thought?
The start of 2018 saw me investing in several indoor plants and I have actually managed to make them grow! 
A lovely lady at the nursery gave me sound advice about soaking from below not watering from the top and my life has been transformed. 
So has my study.
And the bathroom.
And the kitchen benchtop...
So, I might have become a little bit obsessed in the wake of my newly found success, but indoor greenery is meant to be good for your oxygen levels or your serotonin levels, or something like that, so I'm continuing to poke my green thumbs all over the place..

Best Books
Books second because .... well, they're books!

Eleanor Oliphant is Completely Fine, by Gail Honeyman
I laughed and cried and stayed up late to read it. 
I thought about Eleanor long after I finished the last page, which is my measure of a brilliant book. 
I was reminded of The Rosie Project and A Little Life as I read it - a weird combination, I know, but there you go. 
(This description shows why I'm not a professional book reviewer!)

A Garden of Lilies - Improving Tales for Young Minds, by Prudence A Goodchild (who might have been assisted by Judith Rossell) 
Pure delight in a fancy cloth cover with gold writing. 
Marbled end-papers. 
Beautiful illustrations. 
A red ribbon.
Sigh!
This book of cautionary tales had me roaring with laughter and vowing to buy a copy for every friend as their birthday comes around this year, because who doesn't need a good laugh and bit of Victorian instruction?
Furthermore, I now know what a damson pitter looks like.
I even know what a damson is!

Best Home Decorating Find
Coffee coloured sheepskin
I know!
It's fluffy and it's a delicious coffee colour.
It feels like I'm planting my feet on a little bit of heaven when I get out of bed in the morning.
And I like to imagine sheep bathing in cappuccinos each day so that their wool reaches just the right hue for the rugs.
Olive gives it her vote of approval too.

Olive is not looking relaxed here as she
knows the sheepskin rug is supposed to be a
whippet-free zone.

Best Tradie Tips
Three months after moving into our new house, I'm still dealing with tradies. 
They're all very kind and extremely clever. 
They're also ridiculously late, arriving anything from one to six months after the specified date, and incredibly verbose.
I have become far more relaxed about the extended period of building after accepting the two golden rules for dealing with tradies:

1. Don't hold your breath. 
If you do, you'll pass out and die before they arrive. 
But take heart, they will eventually turn up and, when they do, the job will be completed to perfection.

2. Get ready for a yarn. 
The older the tradie, the longer the yarn. 
There's never enough time to meet the job's agreed deadline, but there's always enough time to spend an hour or two solving the problems of the world. 

Best Movies
Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri
You're sure to have heard of this already, if you haven't already watched it.
This is the best movie I've seen in years and, like the best of books, I thought about it long after it was over. It was full of despicable and complicated characters embroiled in despicable and complicated situations. 
Sounds ghastly, but soooo good and tempered with black humour at just the right moments. 

The Greatest Showman
This one was as light as Three Billboards was dark. 
I tapped my toes and smiled all the way through. I smiled for the whole drive home, too. 
I might need to download a song or two just so I can keep the cheery vibes going.

Best Food
Anything eaten on the veranda with family and friends, while looking out over the hills.
Except for kale.
And I wouldn't really like too much quinoa in my life.
And cheese is better than zucchini.

Huh!
I guess I have come back to love and liberty. 
Friends and family.
The freedom of choice.
Leisure.
Luxury.

Life in 2018 is good.

What have been the lovelies in your life so far this year?

The Great Book Nook Dilemma of 2018

How do you arrange your books?
It's an incredibly important question.
One I've spent many a sleepless hour pondering.

You see, I have a nook in my new study.
Now a nook is nothing special.
It's just a place for the useless overflow of everyday life - baskets of unfolded laundry, old tax files, bicycles with flat tyres, visiting relatives who have outstayed their welcome ...

But this week, a very exciting thing happened. 
Shelves were built and the humble nook was transformed into a book nook.
And a book nook, once stocked with the objects for which it has been designed, is a place of  whimsy and adventure, challenge and learning, comfort and delight.
A book nook is a magical place.

Ooooh. Sends tingles up and down my spine just thinking about it!

But of course, with great blessing, comes great responsibility.
I now had to place my books in the shelves.
And that involved making a Very Important Decision:
HOW WAS I GOING TO ARRANGE MY BOOKS?


HOW
             WAS I
         GOING TO
                          ARRANGE
           MY  BOOKS
                             ?????

Should I arrange them by genre or nationality?
If by genre, what would I do about the books that crossed over? Would a funny travel memoir be under Travel or Humour? Should a historical romance come under History or Romance ... or under  Light and Fluffy, depending on the author? 
If I arranged by nationality, should it be the country in which the author was born or the country in which they lived the greater part of their life? Or should it be the country in which the book is set? And what if the story takes place in multiple countries - like Jules Verne's Around the World in Eighty Days? 

Russian authors.
They just had to go together.

Then I wondered about ranking my books.
I've always loved the idea of arranging my collection from best to worst.

But which book is really my favourite? 
Little Women?
Middlemarch?
The Book Thief?
Cold Comfort Farm?
The Murderers Among Us?
I could go on all day listing options for first place. And then I'd have to choose second, third, fourth.... 

And what about my own books? Is it arrogant to rank them highly? Is it bad publicity not to?

We discussed the ranking dilemma at the dinner table last night. My son said he knew how to make it really easy: 
Imagine there's a gun to your head. You have to choose your top three books. Hesitate and - BANG! - you're dead.
'Okay,' I said, rising to the challenge. 'First: Winnie the Pooh. Second: My Family and Other Animals. Third: The Little Paris Bookshop. No! Hang on! Pride and Prejudice or Emma.'
BANG!
I felt like I was living in a scene from Sophie's Choice.
Ranking, my dear friends, just cannot be done.

So in the end, I compromised. I started arranging my books, loosely, along several lines:

• Nationality of authors - Australian, English, American and The Rest. (Apologies to The Rest, but there weren't so many of you.)
• English text and Danish text.
• Children's books and grown-ups' books.
• Genre.

It wasn't perfect. There were many overlaps and ruthless decisions had to be made. 

Children's books - but this tiny
section also contains Danish,
English and Australian authors and
texts in both the English and Danish
language.

No, it was not perfect.
But it was going along quite well.
Until I decided to add knick-knacks to the shelves.

I love my knick-knacks as much as I love my books. They had to be included.
But where should they go? 

Should the old typewriters be amongst the novels? Or were they more a nuts and bolts sort of thing that should sit with dictionaries, thesauruses and compendiums of well-known lines of poetry and wise sayings?

And shoe lasts - where on earth should they sit? With a book like Tracks or The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry? With the Brothers Grimm fairy tales collection because of The Elves and the Shoemaker? Or amidst the DIY-ish books - cook books, gardening books, how to draw books?

And then there were the bird cages. It would be perverse to sit them alongside What Bird is That? Even more perverse near the fable, The Hen Who Dreamed She Could Fly.  Perhaps beside The Goldfinch would be better - marginally.

In the end, I opted for a mix of meaning and aesthetics. 

A typewriter seemed to belong alongside
the work of some great old English writers -
and the orange casing tied in sweetly with an
orange book spine or two.

The photo of my father-in-law's dart victory
 and this wooden duck have absolutely
nothing to do with Leon Uris.

At the end of two long days, I was finished. My book nook was arranged to my satisfaction. It felt logical and orderly and looked lovely.
Perfect, actually.

And then, my son came in and asked for some book recommendations ... AND TOOK THEM AWAY!!!!

And now there are gaps.

And THEN I realised that there are a few books on loan that might not fit into their appropriate place when returned.

And there are books on order.

And there will be books for birthdays and Christmases.

And suddenly, my tightly organised book nook  seemed not so cleverly organised after all.
AAAAAAAGH!


How do you organise your books?

Blind Love ... of a Book

Today’s confession … er blog … is about books. 

I love books.

I hope you read those words aloud, luxuriating in them so they came out as, ‘I LOOOOOVE BOOKS!’  

And, at the same time, you will have pictured me fluttering my eyelashes and fanning my face with both hands while bluebirds swooped and twittered around my head.

Yes, I love books with a capital O. 
O is for OBSESSIVELY.

And the obsession grows with every passing year.

                                                                                               

The other day, a friend told me that she was about to read Winnie the Pooh for the very first time. Winnie the Pooh! I almost swooned with envy. What a delicious, warm, fuzzy, scrummy surprise she was in for. Nothing in literature compares to the world centred around 100 Aker Wood, where we experience the sweetness of Piglet, the ignorant wisdom of Owl, the gloom of Eeyore and the toe-curling cuteness of Pooh. 

But even as I write this, a little bit of fear is creeping in. What if my friend isn't charmed? What if she finds Winnie the Pooh ho-hum? What if she ... I can barely even bring myself to type the words ... What if she doesn't even make it to the end?

How will I ever look her in the eye again? 

How will I keep myself from grabbing her by the shoulders and shaking her back and forth until her teeth rattle, shouting, ‘WHAT ON EARTH IS WRONG WITH YOU?!!!”

And there, my dear friend, lies the crux of the issue and the core of today's confession/blog. When I love a book - I mean truly LOOOOVE a book - I find myself feeling irrationally protective. 
And it's affecting my book life. Deeply. I've stopped lending novels willy-nilly (and I love willy-nilly lending!). I hesitate to ask people's opinions on my deepest literary loves (and I love discussing my love for my literary loves!). 

I'm more than happy for you to think differently from me about politics, religion, art, exercise, child-rearing and the ideal amount of cake to eat for breakfast. But if you tell me that you didn't really like a book that I have loved and adored, I’m devastated.

Horrified.
Traumatised.

I want to weep.
I want to clutch the abused novel to my chest and rock it soothingly back and forth.
How can you not dote on this beautiful creation? The author has worked so hard to produce a masterpiece and now you are telling me that you:

     a) skimmed over the middle ten chapters.

     b) didn’t get past page 30.

     c) tore it to shreds and tossed it in the compost bucket.

Why don’t you just stick a dagger in my heart and twist it around?

I know.  It makes me sound a tad special (or a whole heap of bonkers).

But there you go. 

That's what I've become.

So before my family and friends stage an intervention, I am going to take the first step to recovery. It might not seem like much, but it's a biggy for me. I am going to lay my heart on the line and tell you about my latest passion …

The Little Paris Bookshop, by Nina George.

Oh my goodness! This book has it all ... in my opinion. (See how I did that? It hurt, but I did it.) 

It makes me laugh. 

It makes me cry. 

It makes me long to pick up a pen and write beautiful words. It’s a story of love, loss, friendship, renewal, life, death, literature and a fable-like journey down the river. 

And it’s set in France - Paris to Provence!!! Ooh la la! Doesn’t it sound delicious?

However ... GULP ... feel free to give me your honest opinion about this book. Even if it is not the same as mine.

Just be gentle when you break the news to me.

Very gentle.

And maybe accompany the message with a box of chocolates and a bouquet of flowers … and a darned good, water-tight reason as to why you don’t think it’s brilliant.

Here are a few delectable quotes from The Little Paris Bookshop.

Just to whet your appetite.
Not to sway you.

Well maybe …

He sold books by weight to anyone under fourteen: two kilos for ten euros.

Aren’t we running at a loss?’ asked Max.

Perdu shrugged his shoulders. ‘Financially speaking, yes. But it’s well-known that reading makes people impudent, and tomorrow’s world is going to need some people who aren’t shy to speak their minds, don’t you think?’ 

and... 

The reality of love is better than its reputation. 

and this gem, right at the end of the novel ...

Jean Perdu sits in the farmhouse’s summer kitchen …writing in his Great Encyclopaedia of Small Emotions: A Guide for Booksellers, Lovers and Other Literary Pharmacists.

He is making an entry under K: 'Kitchen solace - the feeling that a delicious meal is simmering on the kitchen stove, misting up the windows, and that at any moment your lover will sit down to dinner with you and, between mouthfuls, gaze happily into your eyes. (Also known as living.)’ 

New Beginnings

Happy New Year!

And happy new blog site to me!

It's a long time since I last blogged. Nine months. Enough time to grow a baby! Which I haven't. But many women have. Over four and a half million babies born already this year.

I think I'll call the lull in my blog The Gestation Period. I like that. It sounds like I was deliberately withdrawing from blogging while I developed my musings into something beautiful and full of life. It's a lie, of course, but a lovely one. And it sounds a whole heap better than The Great Disorganisation of 2016.

I haven't been idle, though. I've been doing stuff all over the place. Here's a quick fill-in:

ONE

I did a road trip, The Telling Tales Tour. I travelled to Melbourne, Bendigo, Sydney and Brisbane with a marvellous group of fellow authors. I spoke to school children, teachers and librarians - anyone who'd listen, really - alongside the amazing authors Judith Rossell, Tiffany Hall and C M Gray.

 

With Tiffany Hall

With Judith Rossell and CM Gray

TWO

I met with a range of lovely friends for lunch, dinner, craft sessions, life-changing chats and wildly competitive games nights. Yes. You read that correctly. GAMES NIGHTS. I have a friend who fancies herself as Grant Denyer and likes to host Deal or No Deal nights. It's a hoot.

THREE

I ushered two new books into the world - Olive of Groves and the Great Slurp of Time  and Olive of Groves and the Right Royal Romp. Both true stories, of course.

FOUR

I continued to garden like a maniac. Episodes of frost, flood, scorching heat, earwigs and thistles have made this a challenge, but I still truly believe that I can make my one and a half acres of earth look like Versailles.

FIVE

I crocheted a dashing new coat for Olive, my precious little whippet. It keeps the winter chills at bay and she’s terribly proud of her herself when wearing it. 

 

I know! She looks a little sheepish here, but when she
heads out into the lane, she trots with pride. Truly!
The Great Dane slinks behind, blushing with
embarrassment.

SIX

I hit the road again for Book Week, visiting wonderful schools in Wagga Wagga, Jugiong and Canberra. And I did my all-time favourite Canberra thing, which is eating cake with my mother.

SEVEN

I fed my already raging Scandimania by travelling to Sweden, Norway and Denmark. My love affair with all things Scandinavian began 30 years ago when I first met the Great Dane and it was wonderful to expand my horizons. (Actually, I’m not sure that you really can expand your horizons within the confines of an obsession, but I gave it a good shot!)

Boat houses on the harbour at Smogen, Sweden.

Reflections on a lake near Sognefjord, Norway.

On the Pulpit Rock with the Great Dane, 605m above
Lysefjord, Norway.

EIGHT

I spent lots of time daydreaming, reading, writing, drawing, taking photographs, arranging treasures in little trays, baking, experimenting with computer graphics, splashing ink about  - wandering wherever the creative spirit led me.

NINE

I harnessed some of that loopy-la-la creativity and wrote a new children’s story. The manuscript reached my publisher just five days before Christmas. There’s action, adventure, mystery, romance, travel,  ravioli and gelati. Sounds like I’ve written an Italian soap opera. Maybe I have!

TEN

We bought a block of land - our own little slice of hill and granite and grass. Stay tuned for more details and dreams and schemes. 

The Great Dane pretending to be an Aussie farmer.
That's our hill in the background!

Have a squiz at this!

For a mind-boggling glimpse at the rising tally of births this year, 

CLICK HERE.

I'll be blogging every Friday, so feel to drop on by or sign up for blogs by email. (Look up to the right!)