Fire and Ice - and an award

Well, what can I say, blogging is sporadic and infrequent - and is likely to become more so as the creative juices start to flow... Yep, I think I am finally finding my way clear to start working on a huge rewrite of my Young Adult paranormal novel. I still have a lot of research that I want to do - instead of being "original" like everyone insists, I want to revert to the classic mythology and then move forward from there. So please do bear with me if I become even more absent than usual.


It's strange actually because February is always the month when ideas really start to flow for me - something to do with harvesting perhaps, it being the end of summer... Who knows.

But even if I am a little absent in the blogosphere there will always be words, because words are what I do - I can't seem to help myself. So here's a little something I scribbled the other morning, after stepping outside... Just words...

Fire and Ice

There’s an uncharacteristic chill in the hazy February air, as though autumn and its wispy mists have arrived early. But it seems unlikely. An unearthly yellow-orange glow filters the sunlight, washing the trees and the grass with an artist’s pale watercolours. Is it indeed fog, I wonder? Or is it smoke? I can’t smell fire.

Yet as the morning unfolds and the sinister orange glow refuses to pass and the vapours shrouding the mountains don’t lift, I’m made to wonder again.

I want to try and capture the eerie light, though I hardly feel I’m able; I’m not an impressionist behind a camera lens. I venture outside, stunned at the way the light filters through the leaves of the grapevine.

And then I smell it. The unmistakable smell of burning bush. The smoke lingers high in the sky. It swathes the mountains in gauzy arms, blocking them from view. You shall not see what I am doing here.

The scrub has been tinder dry all summer.

I had said when the season began that we should expect fires. You could feel it in the air, in the tremors of breath beneath the earth, in the sap that surged through the trunks of trees. There was a restlessness on the mountain slopes that slunk down into the suburbs and jostled with dreams to be noticed.

Of course, I was being fanciful, wasn’t I…

But as the acrid bite of burning scrub tickles the edges of my nostril, I am reminded of what I sensed, of what I knew.

Fire.

Just as gazing on the Australian cherry trees I know it’s going to be a bitter winter. Three successions of blooming in one season. More cherries than I have ever seen. Oh it will snow this year.

Icily.



And then, and then... there was an award - from both Lakeviewer of at Sixtyfivewhatnow and Angela at Letters from Usedom. Thank you so much for this very special award.

The Best Blog Thinker Award

In the words of the person who created it:
"This award acknowledges the values that every Blogger displays in their effort to transmit cultural, ethical, literary, and personal values with each message they write. Awards like this have been created with the intention of promoting community among Bloggers. It`s a way to show appreciation and gratitude for work that adds value to the Web."

And of course, in time honoured tradition, I must pass it on.

And so this award goes to... (applause, please ladies and gentlemen!)

Debi Alper who is currently reliving her experiences of the Grenadian revolution on her blog. Debi is an author and reading about her experiences is both riveting and eye-opening.

Kim at Mouse Medicine, who always has something wise and insightful to say.

To Sue Guiney who takes us with her on her journey of creative expression and writing with tremendous insight.

To Steph of The Biopsy Report who has written tirelessly and courageously about illness and the Irish health system.

To Renee of Graulhet Bonjour who gives us a unique insight into life in a small French town and so broadens our horizons - and of course, one must not forget her intrepid hound, the sleuth writer, Ms Cybele Christie - this award goes to her too!

And finally to Ernest of Rub2Neurons who claims to abhor awards and all the sycophantic behaviour that goes with them. He thinks, he postulates and he is insightful, outspoken and decidedly witty - see what I mean by visiting his other blog... The God Diaries.

To put the award on your blog, this in case you are technically challenged... Right click on the blog award image above and select "save as" - save it to the file of your choice on your pc and from there, in the usual manner of posting images to you blog, well, post it!