For the first time I'll take my postcards with me - can you see them? White paper, beautiful handmade white Khadi paper, 300gsm, NOT, torn to postcard size. I had been thinking of doing this before: take paper, make postcards, put in envelopes and off they go. This time, I'm well prepared. Only need to pick up some envelopes, perhaps en route in Madrid tomorrow evening?
Among my travel wishes was this bit of poetry. M., I hope you don't mind me sharing? It's explicit - pretty much so... I like the image of shoes as boats floating on the water - filled with emptiness and journeys. I am sure my gran would have marvelled at it too. Thank you, my dear!
OLD SHOES
Don’t throw them out, don’t put them
in the rubbish bin. They’re full
of two things, emptiness and journeys.
They’re boat-shaped, but (you say) what water
is left for them to swim on? They’re empty -
but what chapters of me are curled up in them?
Autobiographies, all mine
who walk the roadless landscapes
of memory. - But there are memories still to be born
and emptinesses to be suffered.
-Don’t take them away. I’m balanced
between two times, between two loves -
times past and the ones I’ve still to meet
that’ll give me emblems like old shoes, boat-shaped,
lifeboat-shaped, full of survivors.
Norman McCaig
Now: more packing. What book I wonder? In my 'I will be going to Chile soon' mood a few months ago, I picked up various: a bit of Allende (on homesickness), a horrible travel chick lit piece (it's already passed on to the charity shop) and Bruce Chatwin's In Patagonia:
Now, it's a toss up between Chatwin or another one that is lingering on my window sill.
Different continent, but as I'm currently compiling a list of must see places, Namibia (or thereabouts) figures highly and Uwe Timm's Morenga has been luring me for a while.
Well... I can sleep once more over it.
But: now I need to go and clean my bathroom - just as much as my Granddad was scolding me for not cleaning the bath every time I have a shower, he also thinks I'll may be so mad as to go to China next. Well, I happily disappoint on the former, but possible not on the latter ;), after Namibia, New Zealand, a land journey from Berlin to Jerusalem via Damascus, the Rocky Mountains, Yellowstone, Cadiz, Patagonia, Alaska,...
Now... there'll be postcards... hopefully, just wait and see.
6 comments:
I can sense your excitement in preparing for your trip to Chile. What a distance, what an adventure.
Your cards will tell the story.
Bon voyage!
:) well... it's a bit obvious, isn't it ;)
Thanks, Jeanette!
Have a wonderful trip, Gesa. It's great to see the paper you plan to bring and the pastels as well. I'm going away myself (to Alaska) in June and am already planning what drawing things to bring so I can imagine your excitement. It was a treat to open up this month's Pastel Journal and see your abstract pastel painting there - congratulations! Bon voyage!
I have home made paper too and what a great use for it! Bonvoyage! (SP?)
Lovely poem.
What a beautiful poem.
Thanks everyone, the paper still hasn´t been out yet. But now the conference is over, I´m several hours north of Santiago and am getting into holiday mood and mode. A few trips planned to the coast, pengiuns and rainforests, and into some rural valleys for the night sky. Yesterday I already got a glorious foto of a waxing moon through a strong teleskope. How lucky am I???
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