Leaving social media and choosing the snail

I've just finished the most amazing book, The Sound Of A Wild Snail Eating. I don't know why this book, of all the books I've read and held, hit me like it did, but as I read the story of this woman and her illness and the snail that saved her life I wanted to stop time. I wanted to slow down.

Perhaps I have my own life in need of saving.

I wanted to connect deeper.

I wanted to stop scrolling.

Blogging might be archaic but I like it here. I like to linger in my thoughts. I've always preferred blogs to instagram, FB, it allowing just the tiniest bit of current beneath the surface.

So I've left scrolling behind and I've been in my garden, watching snails.

*****

This new painting is something I've been wanting to work on, the pure abstract. I've tried them before but a face always comes and I give way and give the painting over. This one happened in reverse. A face came and then it turned giving way to this...

I think it's quite beautiful.

I wasn't sure I wanted to part with it, but I am putting it up in the shop.

*****

Thank you to all of you who stay with me here, take that time, linger longer.

A poem for today by Mary Oliver (I read her collection every day.)

MAY

What lay on the road was no mere handful of snake. It was

the copperhead at last, golden under the street lamp. I hope

to see everything in this world before I die. I knelt on the

road and stared. Its head was wedge-shaped and fell back to

the unexpected slimness of a neck. The body itself was thick,

tense, electric. Clearly this wasn't black snake looking down

from the limbs of a tree, or green snake, or the garter, whiz-

zing over the rocks. Where these had, oh, such shyness, this

one had none; then it jerked towards me. I jumped back

and watched as it flowed on across the road and down into

the dark. My heart was pounding. I stood a while, listening

to the small sounds of the woods and looking at the stars.

After excitement we are so restful. When the thumb of fear

lifts, we are so alive.