** we'll be the wild ones running with the dogs today

all those rushing about

with lists and wishes to fulfil

take a moment if you can

to breathe

we did that here yesterday

on the hills of Sonnac

we sat 

the sound of cowbells

birds

 fresh crisp air

we gathered juniper, pine and rosemary

then back home I put them onto my fireplace

a festive forage

happy holidays my dears

Be patient toward all that is unsolved in your heart and try to love the questions themselves, like locked rooms and like books that are now written in a very foreign tongue. Do not now seek the answers, which cannot be given you because you would not be able to live them. And the point is, to live everything. Live the questions now. Perhaps you will then gradually, without noticing it, live along some distant day into the answer.

— RAINER MARIA RILKE, LETTERS TO A YOUNG POET  — 

++ if you want to know the things we see

the "Dread Room"

has gradually been transformed

the lower section of the wall 

had been painted in a very old

oil and earth mix

which proved problematic when painted

as it kept bleeding through

we scrubbed it with a solution of this

then carefully rolled a thin coat

of oil based matt paint

and prayed

it worked!

then the task of scraping off years of paint

from conduit and sockets

and finding a match for the skirtings and doors

it pains me to tosh over these beauties

on top of all the really bad paint already on them

but time and budget won't allow for now

all I need now is furniture 

and a lovely light fitting to replace this pathetic bulb!

now it's The White Room

like that scene in Bruce Almighty 

when he meets God

"we spin, we turn, watch and wait
as the world just creeps on by"