Aerial Silk Showgirls and 10-foot Tall Porcelain Androids

This morning, dragon breath leaking from my lips, I walked hand-in-hand with my Lady Love along the canal. Wood smoke from our neighbours on the cut kissed the air, frost teased the cobbles. This might all sound somewhat chocolate box, but it qualifies as standard for this time of year in the Three Bridge Kingdom.

However, it has to be said that whist it is common to wend our rosey-cheeked way along the towpath as the city begins to wake, I do not usually do it wearing full black tie. The blame for such out of place ostentation lies in last night. Last night was an awards ceremony. This meant a Mayfair hotel, Dara Ó Briain, champagne, sea bass with a Pernod sauce, aerial silk showgirls and 10-foot tall porcelain androids wearing Venetian carnival masks.

Generally, I do not like award ceremonies. The constant forced mentions of corporate sponsors makes you ache for the blade, the table talk tends towards mind-crushingly dull and I never win. Yet surrounded by good Yorkshire company and with the Grosvenor House threatening to tumble into an episode of Doctor Who, enjoying myself was easy – despite the fact it looked as if the volto might have had laser weapons built into their black opal eye sockets.

The Premier Photographer of the Three Bridge Kingdom

One of my photos of London as Hoth ended up migrating from the semi-secret photo blog into the local paper. This may have less to do with my merits as a snapper than I would like to think given I live with the publication’s deputy editor. Nepotism is such a dirty word.

My little moment of glory was further diminished by the fact the picture was incorrectly credited to Surreal Girl. Not only did she upstage me by getting her own Hoth shot on the top of page five, she stole my chance to be recognised as the premier photographer of the Three Bridge Kingdom. I am crushed.

English Dreaming, English Rain as an Illustrated Publication

In the last few days, many readers have asked me to post some pictures of Avignon, Musée d’Orsay and the Three Bridge Kingdom. I am afraid to say that this is not going to happen. As a writer, it is not unreasonable to expect that the focus of my primary blog is always going to be words.

Besides, photography is not my strongest area. I do not have the eye. All my good shots echo the tricks I learnt from working with and managing photographers when I was a newspaper editor. The little I know about composition and framing devices* rarely rises my pictures above the barely competent or commonplace.

While English Dreaming, English Rain as an illustrated publication is not going to happen, I have created a new blog where readers who want to see my photographic hackings will be indulged. Given the continuing need to occult certain information about my life from those that would stalk me or see some profit in making threats into manifest action, the new blog will be strictly invitation only. If you are a friend, regular reader or correspondent and want an invite, just email me at the usual address.

*Strangely, when I used be curious about Anne-Marie Forker, I saw that the photographs she was selling in galleries used the same ‘shoot through an archway/ogee or other dramatic window frame’ that I had demonstrated to her when we both used to take shots for one of her younger sister’s art projects. I guess this means that at least some of my framing devices do not suck.

The Centre of my Universe

The gravity of the Three Bridge Kingdom is impacting on my blood. Separating the settler from the gallowglass. One pools in my feet, the other runs only in my brain. The knowledge that there will come a day when I leave already projects a rupture in my heart.

As the attraction of place becomes stronger, it seems as if it is also warping the trajectories of others I love. Capturing them, creating orbits around the centre of my universe. Coalescing friends into an accessible solar system, ordered by the musica universalis of squabbling geese and boats gently rolling on the water.

The fact that my co-author’s partner lives canalside means the weekends he visits, my home feels like the terrace abode of The Beatles from Help. This week Tim Dedopulos moved from sleeping on my sofa to being a near neighbour with his own resident card. The gravitation even pulls in visitors from Verwood and Hadleigh who have been distanced for years. I can almost believe that one Sunday morning I will walk out for the papers and encounter my errant Canadian brother on the towpath.

These are harsh times and I need my mojo back. The echo of it at Worth Matravers made me realise just what I was missing. If I am to find it, maybe I should look closer to home. The sustaining magic of life is in the small wonder of friends and the soul-kissed love of my little patch of London.

At 9am the Thunder Started

With a coincidental precision that would please any maker of atomic clocks, at 9am the thunder started. The roaring detonation outlasted the final Greenwich pip by several seconds and then gave way to solid hiss of rain. Explosive drops cratering the canal, pulling leafs into water.

Radio 4 headlines absorbed, I walk my bruises along the towpath. The canalside air is a warm kiss, the downpour pure espresso. After Belfast, Dorset and broken toes, this is the first time in three weeks I have actually fulfilled my boyfriend duty to get and the papers and milk.

It is not the rain that keeps me close to canal today. There is a natural indolent gravity to the Three Bridge Kingdom when you feel under the weather in every way. It is easy to wait for the barge which serves as a mobile shop to chug passed. I can buy beer for the batter at the end of the road, pick rain-washed rosemary from the towpath.

Night comes. I cook sausage toad and roasted vegetables for four, pour wine. I am surrounded by friendship, laughter and love. There are no greater forces to bind me to this place than those.

A Year in the Three Bridge Kingdom

A breakfast of scrambled egg with basil and cherry tomatoes is taken while watching water traffic create duck scattering wakes. The sun fills Lisson Grove Moorings. I listen to the wood creak as the boats gently roll in the heat. It is my mother’s first visit canalside so we take the boat along the Regent. It is too languid a day for the exertion of locks so we push along without falling or climbing.

The route offers tunnels, waving children and a baby warthog. This would be enough adventure, but travelling with my mother turns it into a botanic expedition. From wild mallow to water hemlock, plants are named and lore passed on.

At dusk, the sun plays alchemist, turns stone to gold. I exhale. Let tension fall away with the last of the day. It has been a year in the Three Bridge Kingdom and my heart grows with each sunset and each dawn across the water. You know you have a home rich with love when you can invite others to share it.