The Lamp of Beauty

The gilding - at long last.

2007-11-11T13:28:00.000Z

After getting your background sealed and shellaced, the next step is to apply oil size. Harder than it sounds... It is a kind of tacky varnish, with the number next to it (3,6,12,16 (which is much rarer) and so on) referring to the number of hours it will stay 'open' i.e. in which time the gold can be applied. It must be put on slowly, but not too slowly, carefully and with as few streaks as humanly possible. This is VERY tricky when it is not a simple straight or flat area, such as around the outline of a curly-headed angel with wings! When in doubt, take the size closer to the edge and you can either a) scrape the gold gently back later on or b) (and perhaps safer) paint over the gold in one or two tiny areas, as with oil gilding there are always areas which need to be readdressed. And I had that from a very experienced, talented furniture restorer and gilding teacher, so I'm not making excuses... well not many ;-)

To apply the gold, you must wait until the size is only just tacky and squeaks when you very, very, VERY lightly drag your finger knuckle along an inconspicuous point. Don't use a fingertip, unless you want everyone to be able to identify the gilder in years to come... When it squeaks and doesn't mark you are ready to gild. Although I used six hour size, it was actually ready to go a bit earlier than that - you can almost see the difference and if you have the luxury of a spare piece of wood that you have prepared, I'd make a sort of 'gilding sample' so you don't necessarily have to squeak the actual board. The sheet gold used is pressed into pieces of tissue paper, rather than loose leaf which I prefer as it gives an absolutely smooth finish - the imprint of the tissue means it will never be entirely mirror-like. Plus sometimes the sheets aren't stuck in very well, so if in doubt, gently compress the book before attempting to use the sheets. Trial and error here I'm afraid, mostly error on my part... You can either use a whole sheet, if it is a large flat area, or if you are gilding over borders or around a complicated area, use scissors (yes, but good quality ones with un-nicked blades) to cut up the sheet. You then apply the gold straight on, no brushes required and lightly press down on the back of the paper. I will admit right now that most of my gold came off the sheets (thank you unnamed supplier!) and I had no real idea what I was doing. All the same, with a bit of patience, you can get it to look ok, viz the above picture. When you are done, as with water gilding you can lightly brush the surface to get rid of any tags of gold and lightly burnish the finish, which is how I got the glow here. I'm not that pleased with it but as my first oil gilding experience, it's not unbearable. Stick to water gilding is my main advice...

from jewels to background

2007-10-29T17:58:00.000Z

Once the jewels are all painted in, complete with white and black washes to create the facets (if you want to, you don't have to but this is quite a 'greek' icon, so I wanted to go the whole hog), you use some quick-drying japanese gold size (which is ready to use within about fifteen minutes) and pressed-leaf gold to create the mounts or settings for the jewels. The effect is remarkable, especially if you sacrifice a very small 00/000 brush to avoid the 'clumpy' effect you sometimes see on icons. (blech, personal strong dislike, can you tell?).
That's about it, apart from the background and titles. I decided to try some oil gilding, which was a first for me. Perhaps a last as well, as it requires you to use copious amounts of shellac (smelly) and oil size (a tacky varnish), after adding a rich colour to the first coats of shellac which you use to seal the very absorbent gesso. The reason for that is that you don't want different areas of the gold size being absorbed at different rates. It's a bit complicated and trust me, unless this is an icon that is going to be outside or get heavy wear and tear, just stick to water gilding. Harder to get initially but a much more versatile finish. Here's the photo of the initial stage, with screaming red shellac..

A bit more on the icon

2007-10-22T14:48:00.000+01:00

Yes, it's been a while but since the icon was finished a while ago, it's just a question of posting more photos until we reach the end of this process. I hope it's been useful for at least one or two of you, in the zillions of people who use the internet at large.

After the red layer has been done, the face becomes enlivened even further by restating some of the earlier dark lines, shadows around the hairline and at the neck and an overall checking of colour and tone balances. This is something that differs with each icon as it's impossible to be completely prescriptive about how defined something will look at the outset. This one also shows the layers of paint washed in to form the very unusual wings - these were ones which Aidan had chosen and I've not seen them elsewhere. The colours were indian red and black for the base, then washes of titanium white and ivory black on top. The jewels are either drawn or painted on free hand, and then filled with an opaque white so that the colours on top have a glow to them. You can see where I've filled in the red ones already.

Help me back into the boat.

2007-08-10T11:27:00.000+01:00

I found this on the Orthodixie blog and thought what a brilliant way to start a sermon. I'll never have to give one but it was very, very helpful. More pictures to come next week, as this week has just been one crazy day after another!

* * *

I have a few announcements to make before today’s sermon.

First of all, if you see my daughter, or any child for that matter, acting up in church, teach her – them – how to pray. We come to church on the Lord’s Day to pray. There’s a whole week in between to learn behavior and behave. Here, let’s pray. (The same thing goes for adults.)

If you see me with a frown on my face, forgive me. It speaks more of my sins than it does our relationship. If you’ve time, help me out. A smile alleviates a frown every time.

If you want more things in church: more activities, more fellowship, church school supplies, carpet – whatever it may be – give more money. That’s just the way it works.

Want more people in church? Invite them.

If you see me sinning, don’t encourage me. Like a child in need of attention, I’ll often show off in a rather ill manner. Perhaps your loving me, in spite of myself, will help to exorcise the demons with whom I’m all too familiar. Besides, if you join me in sin, we’ll be doubly miserable.

If you catch me entering gossip, stop me. For I pray each day "forgive me, O Lord, the same way I forgive others.” You’d be a great help to me, yourself, and everyone if you’d lovingly hush me up.

If you see me feasting on Wednesday, Friday, or during Seasonal Fasts ... forgive and reprove me with love. For in so doing, I show my kinship with Judas and those who crucified the Lord Jesus. Yet, with your help, I can repent and experience the God of Resurrection and Light.

Please don’t sit throughout the Liturgy unless you have a physical ailment that requires it. We’re a lazy people in this modern age, but true prayer has always been hard work. All able bodies should stand in remembrance of the Resurrection & the Day of Judgment. Let us attend.

By all means, if you hear me speaking heresy – please, quail my tongue with love. For the Saviour has sacrificed too much for me and my salvation for me to forfeit the Kingdom with lying lips. God forbid that I should drag you with me.

If you observe me being patient in a time of trial, give thanks to God for it is His Spirit that guides me.

If, however, you see me being impatient, forgive me. I come by it naturally, even from Adam and Eve.

If my way of life is not the same as yours, it does not mean that we are not of the same Christian family. It just means that God in His wisdom has fashioned us in a unique manner – yet, with the same Lord as God and Father of all.

If you know that I’m in need, help me. For God surely will bless those who bless Him.

If you find my attitude, my words, my every way of life leaves you cold, please don’t abandon me. I’m lonely. Perhaps your presence, love, forgiveness, and long-suffering will help to melt my frozen heart.

If you think you have sacrificed enough, it is often at that very moment that God asks the most of you.

If you’re not tithing to the church [giving at least 10% of your income], please don’t complain. Because God Himself answers our plea with a challenge “Give me 10%, and I’ll fill your storehouses.” (By the way, for some reason, those who tithe complain less.)

If you make a mess, clean it up. Otherwise you manufacture enemies as well.

If you notice someone absent from church, call them. They may need you.

Most of all, if you see me walking on water, help me back into the boat. For, by myself, I shall perish.

In the name of the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Amen.

The boat represents the Church, the disciples represent all Christians. The stormy sea is our life. We are in the Church, the boat, because Christ commands us to be there. Disciples are obedient. Christ comes to us in times of danger. Notice that Christ did not command Peter to come to him. Rather he permitted the act. Peter was not acting out of obedience, but boldness. Peter became frightened, his faith was shaken. Why? Chiefly because of his foolishness in leaving the boat, the Church. Thus, our first lesson here is do not leave the safety of the boat, the Church. Christ commands them to get into the boat! When we do find ourselves outside the ark of our salvation (boat/Church), we must, like Peter, cry out “Lord, save me!” And He will. Christ not only commands us to enter the Church, He also has mercy upon us when we are disobedient, leading us back to the calm haven of our salvation the Church. It is in the confines of the Church that we [like Thomas] recognize Jesus as our Lord and God. It is in the Church that we, like the disciples in the boat, worship Him.

So, I repeat:

If you see me walking on water, help me back into the boat.

For, by myself, I shall perish.

Even if my sins and pleas are seemingly self-centered,
do not be as I ... reach out and grab hold of my hand.

For this, Christ died ... we live.

Help me, my brothers and sisters in Christ,
for I need you -- we need each other -- in this storm tossed sea.

Friendship

2007-07-06T19:25:00.000+01:00

I was looking at this blog and thinking it had become a bit, well, monotonous. I don't hear anyone rushing to disagree. Thinking (again, I know) about what makes life brighter, even in dark corners, I thought of friendships and the friends we have at various times in our lives.

When we are young children, if we are lucky, we have a 'best friend' in our class at school. I've recently seen this with a friend's little boy and was struck at the absolute devotion he expressed one minute, the annoyance roused in the next and the fact that neither made any difference to the concrete fact of their friendship. As we get older and perhaps move or change schools, our interests change and sometimes our friends do as well. Perhaps we have a 'gang' or one or two special friends, perhaps we dress the same and listen to the same music. These friends can become our world, our reference points, our safe harbour from a world that doesn't, couldn't, understand us. If we are fortunate enough to go to college then we meet fellow students from around the world - fellow travellers on the path of higher education. Quite often all we have in common is the subject we are studying but something, somewhere within us calls, "deep to deep" and we make new and exciting friends. Perhaps we meet our future partners at university. This time we all know that we are likely to head off in different directions and pursue different goals but again, the fact of our friendship is solid, a "firm foundation".

I've recently been aware that I have no friends from any of these points in my life. I have friends I have made at many of my wildly varied jobs, including my husband John, who I would describe as my 'best friend' (although perhaps in a more primary school kind of way...), I have friends from my interests, mainly singing and sewing, and finally, I have many friends from Church. Although the population of our community changes with frightening rapidity, as the academic year comes and goes, research grants start and finish, contracts are given and end, there is a core of membership which (I hope) tries to welcome these new members, make them a little less homesick by providing them with a 'new' home and sends them off with prayers and even a husband or wife. Or children, depending on how long they stay! We are all blessed when some of them even choose to stay forever.

We have recently started a group on the new 'Facebook' website (and I'm going to be a technopeasant and not put a link in just yet) so that many of our members can stay in touch, let us know their own news and we can share our. How else can you tell people in the USA, Canada, Greece and the south of England about a baby being born here in Edinburgh within a couple of hours? (OK, so there's the phone but who uses that now?) (and I am kidding). What an amazing thing the internet has become. While on the one hand it enables the perpetration of some of the most awful abuses known to man, it can, when used with discernment, be a wonderful way to share friendship all around the world. I firmly believe that conflict begins when we stop talking, stop trying and stop being friends. The internet, then, could be a very valuable way to prevent conflict and, of course, to help us continue friendships for as long as possible.

In spite of the many pressures we are under, the huge geographical distances we find separating us, the breakneck speed at which each month, each year, seems to disappear, just being able to say a few words, whether it is 'hello', 'thanks', 'sorry' or even 'help' is often all that we need. The one friend we don't need the internet to contact, the one we all have in common, responds particularly well to these simple words and expressions of our heart. I don't remember many of my childhood hymns, but "what a friend we have in Jesus" sits there alongside "Jesus loves me, this I know". Perhaps I was wrong in saying that I don't have any friends from my childhood or, more likely, He knew me long before I showed up on that sunny August morning, satchel in hand.

not yellow.... RED this time!

2007-07-01T16:42:00.000+01:00

What I love about iconography is that you can use a very limited palette - (thinks quickly): black, white, yellow ochre/mars yellow, red ochre, a green ochre e.g. avanna, a brown e.g. burnt umber and if necessary a blue (I like Lapis or azurite, for a more greeny blue). With these seven colours you can create almost any tone required for an icon and most of them won't be used for flesh - you only need three or perhaps four for that.

Having done almost all of the flesh so far with yellow and more or less white, we now bring in red, this time an English red ochre which is warm but not too bluey or to muddy. A combination of washes, light 'hatching' type strokes and small areas of more concentrated colour warm up the flesh to create a more vivid presence. (That's the theory anyway!).

Further stages on the face

2007-06-30T19:19:00.000+01:00

because I have a funny feeling that picture i just posted was the same as the one before but can't prove it.. Here you can see the photismata, or 'small lights' which are the almost final stage to the face. They can be more or less dramatic, depending on the icon, the style, the painter, the age of the icon etc., but they give a strength, vibrancy and dynamism to the image which could otherwise look a bit soft and over emotional. Perhaps you would disagree?

The end is (almost) nigh

2007-06-30T17:51:00.000+01:00

Well I am sure you are beginning to wonder if I will ever finish this icon! This stage is a further refinement of the flesh, a tidying up of the hair, you can just glimpse the wings, which I have copied from Aidan's original icon with a puddling technique known in the West as "Petit Lac" - more commonly used in Russian style icons and one that Aidan combines with a drier brush style.

Feast of the Apostles St Peter and St Paul

2007-06-29T16:51:00.000+01:00

Happy Feast to all of you out there in Orthobloggingland! We had a lovely if rather small Liturgy this morning and I can't believe that the next fast will be that of the Dormition! Already! This year is flying past far too fast, with a great deal of 'sound and fury'. As a contrast, I was fortunate enough to attend a Liturgy at the hermitage of St Cuthbert on Shepherd's Law last week and while there, I was profoundly moved by the silence - not an absence of noise but something very present and powerful. Later, in a quiet part of the night, I wanted to see if i could capture something of that so wrote a short and very inelegant poem. Here it is, a verbal contrast to all the pictures I usually post.

Down soft and thick
I step into a warm sea of silence.
Behind is noise and distraction
from the calm stillness of fresh air and life.
Thoughts form soundlessly
flowing out, around, through,
enveloping, uplifting, consoling, loving.
Fleeting winds twist leaves
and hair and breath
carrying all away before
the fullness of silence,
the Word with no words.

New Blogging Orthodox Community

2007-06-28T22:10:00.000+01:00

Ok, so I'm a bit behind but now I am returned from my latest stint of dog-sitting (and what fun we had in the muddy park!) and at Vespers this evening met Fr Timothy, priest of the community of St Drostan's, near Fraserburgh. That's quite far north. I don't do geography but even I know it's NORTH. Anyway, the community has a blog here and I think it's wonderful - technology is making it much easier for the widespread Orthodox community in Scotland - and the UK - to keep in contact and support each other. Brilliant! I should also add, just in case, that there is a Facebook group for St Andrews Orthodox Church in Edinburgh - another way for us all to keep in touch, even when overseas.

More icon tomorrow, promise. I am hoping to complete it next week, work permitting. In the meantime, Many Years for the Feast tomorrow!

"0 foremost in the ranks of apostles, and teachers of the world,
intercede with the Master of All to grant safety to the world
and to our souls the great mercy!"

Modelling the face

2007-06-18T19:45:00.000+01:00

This is where you actually start to differentiate areas of the face, by mixing some white into your yellow. I think that all in all you end up with about four variations, going from pure yellow to the palest yellow which is basically white, with a tiny dot of yellow. At this point, you can finally start to say "well a brow muscle goes here, the shadow of the chin stops there, the nostrils separate about here". If you go too far, you end up with lumps rather than a face, if you don't do any at all, you end up with an artificially smooth plane. I suppose no one said it was easy!
p.s. I should add there are some not very deliberate mistakes in this face/hair, so be forgiving please.

More stages - life!

2007-06-17T13:59:00.000+01:00

Suddenly, the image LOOKS BACK at you. Once the eyes are painted in, with a great deal of care since the direction and quality of the gaze can transform an icon with a hair's breadth error, the brows are once again painted, the yellow flesh layer is refined and blended as appropriate and you can see here I've started to put in the main shape of the curls for his hair. Again, these need to make sense and shouldn't just be random forms.

And before we do more yellow...

2007-06-09T18:07:00.000+01:00

we put in the eyes: Yes this also looks very odd. However, you can immediately get a feeling of how alive the Saint/Archangel is. You need to play around a bit here so that you get the image looking in the right direction and it's not too romantic by making them too large.

... and then flesh things out

2007-06-07T22:39:00.000+01:00

OK, so this image will look very odd, unles you know about the mysterious, almost alchemical process that happens in about, oh, two or three layers time. You don't, yet, but it's going to be alright, I promise. So here it is, the first of the flesh layers. You could use a nice yellow ochre although they almost all need further grinding, apart from Sennelier, which can be time consuming. You get almost as nice an effect, depending on the tone of the flesh required, by using a Mars yellow (I think that's iron oxide but I could be wrong). Again, watch for the lumpiness...

Time to liven it up a little...

2007-06-04T17:20:00.000+01:00

OK, so the posts will be a little more sporadic this week: I'm dog sitting for my parents with the bizarrely youthful dog known as Tac. No doubt she has some super-complicated old lady name in Dogworld but to us she's either Tac or just 'pooch'. Or 'mad wee dog'.

Anyway, this is called the 'gleeklasmos' or 'sweet layer' (think of ordering your greek coffee here folks... gleekos or sketos, right?). The red layer goes over the whole face, apart from where you see the dark proplasmos on the finished painting. Yes, everywhere. Yes it looks odd. However, this gives a life and vibrancy to the yellow paint on top and can't be missed out, so this is how it looks.

More on Thursday, perhaps.

Painting in the first lines - more moving around

2007-06-01T10:29:00.000+01:00

Well, once you get the 'carbon' lines on, you need to paint them in or they'll get brushed off quite quickly. I'm too busy to be really enjoying anything and that is such a pain. Anyway, this isn't my icon because I forgot to photograph this stage. You can see though how it is possible to still refine and change the facial features as you get even more used to them and balance things out that may have been changed when you copied it.

Early bird etc

2007-05-31T10:00:00.000+01:00

OK since I'm here and being organised, I'm posting early. This is the second stage of the icon - once the proplasmos (or 'first layer') has settled, you transfer the facial details back onto the face. I use a piece of paper that I've rubbed pigment into as a kind of 'carbon' paper and it's pretty good, plus it lasts for ages.
Enjoy.

Archangel Michael - Proplasmos

2007-05-30T19:38:00.000+01:00

Oh-ok. Here is the next stage, once you've got the drawing right. I'm assuming that you have a properly prepared board with no pin-holes, sanded satiny smooth (that takes a few hours. Why do people think icon painting is quiet and non-energetic? Answer: they've never prepared a board). This shows the plain colours that form the underpinning of the painting - you can see all the colours here and you can also see that the ochre I've used on the face is a bit dry and lumpy. I 'sanded' it back with the sharp edge of a block of wood to knock of the high spots and then fixed it with two glazes of egg and water, so that it makes a good solid base for the face. That gets a lot of painting so you want it to be solid!

More tomorrow folks.

The Archangel Michael

2007-05-28T16:07:00.000+01:00

well here's a brief taster: the pencil drawing that the icon of the Archangel Michael developd from. I think it would be quite cool to put up a picture each day, showing how the process develops and changes. It's still changing although today has been a bit dull - washing, dishes, shopping, feeling /really/ drowsy and not getting myself together beyond making a few phonecalls and catching up with people.

Anyway, here's the drawing. Once I've posted them all here, I'll put them up on my new Facebook page. Yup, suckered into that one too... oh and I'll rotate the next image so you don't get a sore neck!

And..... Relax

2007-05-27T22:17:00.000+01:00

Phew. Just back this evening from a week long icon course in Shropshire (that's near Wales. Nearly Wales. Weary nails...) and a weekend at the mother-in-laws so not making a great deal of sense. New orders, a few inquiries about orders, mail to catch up on and wham, straight back into the swing of things.

More photos to come, now that I've got glorious images from this time around. Oh and I took photos all the way through making this current icon, of the Archangel Michael - what a privilege. I will get to posting them too but no promises.

So, welcome home to sunny Leith and a dead mouse in the middle of the kitchen floor - apparently I made exactly the kind of squeaky noise John expected would be caused by the sight of a tiny furry mouse corpse in the middle of the kitchen floor! Good to know that after seven years of marriage, he really understands me...

It's FRIDAY???

2007-05-11T20:45:00.000+01:00

How did that happen?? OMGoodness my brain!

This week has been very very busy: finishing off two and a half customers, cleaning the house, working out (twice), shopping, singing, drawing, walking, blah blah.

I'm keeping this short and sweet: I have three photo albums to cover in silk for tomorrow, three wee bags to sew for tomorrow (morning folks, not afternoon) and my DH is stuck in the North of England until goodness knows when - so I will sew until I drop. Me, always pushing the deadline?

Nah......

Every second day then!

2007-05-07T10:05:00.000+01:00

Yesterday was strange; sunny and rainy, windy and mild, lazy and active (viz. my forty minute walk in the foresaid weather), working and not working...

And part of the laziness was forgetting to post. Ah well. Here, for your edification, is a picture of some outrageous apple blossom which seems to be everywhere at the moment. This was taken in the churchyard of a chapel built during the Commonwealth in precisely the ornate, royalist and Roman Catholic manner guaranteed to most annoy the Puritan government. What style! The sunlight was just turning that evening shade of gold and a nice breeze was waving the branches around so some of my shots were blurred but what I love most is that the flowers are just so delicate and abundant - there's no real reason for such beauty to be involved in tree reproduction but there you are, that's nature for you.

Oops

2007-05-05T16:43:00.000+01:00

I missed a day! In my defence it was a /very/ quick day! The big news is that the election turned up all sorts of potential fun: we officially have an SNP (nationalist) majority and what I can't believe is how badly the guys who lost are taking it! One local councillor blamed the fact that he was lower down on the ballot list than his younger, less annoying, female fellow Labour candidate for losing: nothing to do with the fact that, as Planning Convenor, he has been roundly condemned for backing a really nasty redevelopment of our historic Old Town, laughingly known as "Caltongate". That's a link to the local people who object to it by the way, not the developers (boo, hiss). You would think, given how much people really dislike the St James centre (think 70s brutalism replacing old and picturescue tenements), they would hesitate to make such a monumental bottom of things again but nooooooohhhhh!

OK, that wasn't meant to turn into a rant: I just object to a) developers who think we really need more hotel and overpriced retail space (COME ON!!) and b) bad losers...

Otherwise, John has a 'dicky tummy' (why is it dicky? not ricky? or tommy?) and I am trying to sew and not worry about getting it myself and wondering whether I should go to vespers and potentially spread it out a bit more... Today's picture is of John at the Yorkshire Sculpture Park looking considerably more cheerful than he is just now. Although right now he's sleeping, which is probably a good thing.

Election Day and Mouse redux

2007-05-03T21:34:00.000+01:00

Well, today's post is sort of about voting: as in, why is it so complicated? We had to elect a regional and a constitutional candidate for the Scottish (not independant) Parliament plus number our preference for the local council in order of which do you dislike least... I still don't know who I will get, even though I know who I /didn't/ vote for! (I think). It will be interesting to see what, if anything, changes tomorrow night when with any luck the results will be in. THEN they will have to start being nice to each other, since we are (sort of) governed by a proportional representation system.

On a more interesting note, the mouse reappeared in a dazed and confused state, this time with John in the room. He of the gentle heart got a big jam jar and put it on top of the wee mouse, which was carefully - and perhaps cruelly - deposited in our back garden. The sounds of a major kitty turf war later on were, I hope, unrelated. I think it must have been poisoned already though because normally you only get a glimpse of this furry brown streak as it whizzes across your room - this one was very, very, drunk...

FInally, here is a nice picture from our recent trip to the Yorkshire Sculpture Park.
There are lots of other cool photos - including lots of bluebells which are a) abundant and b) too early!! on our photo website here.

Ahhhh - the satisfaction of voting AND posting in one day!

A post a day*

2007-05-02T15:31:00.000+01:00

*until I go on holiday at the end of the month.

Today's post is to say that i don't like mice. Nope. Not at all. Especially when they run out from underneath my sofa during my post-breakfast, organisational, pre-doing stuff cup of tea, with their stupid pink feet and ugly tails, all over my carpet. ICKKKK.

Tomorrow, I might show you my new shoes.

What sin isn't.

2007-04-14T19:58:00.000+01:00

Ok, so some deep thinking going on recently. One that has stuck with me is about sin. A lot of people I talk to, Christians included, don't understand what sin is or indeed why so many things that people do every day is regarded as sin (we're talking lust, avarice, etc). John and I watched The Passion of the Christ last week and a few niggles notwithstanding, thought it was very powerful and thought-provoking. Hence me blogging when I should be cooking and sewing at the same time.

Anyway - what I realised as a result from talking to John about the reason for Christ's sacrifice, for His suffering on the Cross etc, for His descent to Hell etc is that Sin is necessarily about doing something bad. It's about not loving God enough to do what He wants, which is always the best for us, His children. That lack of love is the cause of all sin, pain and death in this world, not because you ate a burger on Holy Thursday...

Christ is Risen! He is Risen indeed!

2007-04-08T17:59:00.000+01:00

Christ is Risen and everything else will pass - it's all that matters. Here's a splendid icon to prove just that.

Holy Week

2007-04-04T17:32:00.000+01:00

Here we are: Holy Week. I saw the doc today and officially have icky tonsils (not good for singing and hence v. sore as well as annoying) but will have to wait a coupl of weeks for my blood test results. Hmm. Started very disgusting herbal mixture which must surely do good, since it actually tastes like it can kill bugs! As of today, will do my best to keep Holy Week by myself since I can't set foot in church without singing which would be a Bad Thing for my throat, so pray for me my Brothers and Sisters, and in the meantime, have a splendid Holy Week, followed by a Glorious Pascha, with much rejoicing, sleeping and then lots of stuff you've been missing out on for six weeks.

Laughing Baby

2007-03-28T23:44:00.000+01:00

Quite honestly the best cure for flu-blues you can imagine. I dare you not to have sore sides by the time this wee man is finished!

Sketching and praying

2007-03-28T17:48:00.000+01:00

Well, nearly Holy Week, the Feast of Feasts and I got my regular virus! It seems like almost every year I pick up some long-lasting lurgy and this year is no different. It's so boring I won't even bore you with it. However, being confined to the sofa/bed has one advantage: I was able to get some serious drawing and redrawing and re-redrawing done, so that I can make progress on the icon of Saint Alexandra for my god-daughter, Sasha. I will do an entry about the saint and her life later, but while I'm still vertical today (two naps and counting) I thought I'd put up the fairly finished sketch, so that in the next month or so, when the icon is finished, it can be compared and 'y'all' can see how things change/stay the same during the process of painting. It freaks me out anyway...

Stardust

2007-03-20T19:27:00.000Z

I'm very excited: the Stardust website has got some content: images - lots; wallpapers - several; general notes on plot, film-makers, actors etc. - mainly lists.

Why am I excited? Coz I love Mr Gaiman's books? MMm probably. Also because it's a great story, in the classic quest tradition: boy born in interesting circumstances with a BIG secret, grows up and falls in love, goes on quest, has adventures, meets lots of other people and not only realises his true self but finds his place in the world too. Not your average gap year experience!

The costumes are ok: I say this because it's a sort-of-vaguely-19th century period so the costumes can be the same. I can imagine one or two people who'd like Michelle Pfeiffer-ish or Claire Danes-ish gowns, so I might see if I can scope out more close up images of those. (I am so sad: watched the latest adaptation of Mansfield Park - two hours INCLUDING adverts... and spent a good half of that tutting, exploding, muttering about the mixed up and rather lame costumes on a good half of the women. I suppose that's not a bad ratio). The village of Wall looks a wee bit tame, compared to the description in Mr Gaiman's book (which you have to go read now) but overall it'll be a film to look forward to. Sir Bob de Niro will be in it, along with Peter O'Toole, two of my favourite on screen presences. It doesn't matter much what they do anymore, they just are.

Black Dog

2007-03-14T23:13:00.000Z

How strangely and quickly my faithful companion can sneak up on me. I swear that within, oh, two or three hours it reappeared last evening and now it's hanging onto my ankle with great devotion... If I ignore it long enough it might get bored and go away! Also, why on earth do words disappear, or the desire to connect them up disappear whenever my brain sinks? Hmmm.

More sunshine from the land of 'darkness'

2007-03-13T14:05:00.000Z

That's kind of a pun: the Greek word for darkness is also the word for Scotland (skoteea, since you ask). Anyways, I was chatting to a dear friend this morning about songs that make you dance around and not mind doing the dishes facing the wall and I thought of this one. I've heard it a few times and it is very infectious, quite poppy and FUN. Plus, even though he seems to be from Glasgow, it's just so nice to hear someone sing with their own accent for a change! I mean, short of the Proclaimers who else actually goes with a Scots accent... apart from me of course.

Hey, anyway, I'm off to wear in my own New Shoes and will take a picture of them tomorrow, just to prove what a difference they can make. Enjoy!

Koya Moments - Edinburgh at its most breathtaking

2007-03-13T13:51:00.000Z

I make no apology whatsoever for adding this short time-lapse film by Ewen Meldrum, which is the product of great labour and dedication. Honestly, it explains why I don't feel the need to move anywhere, since I already live in one of the most beautiful cities in Europe, if not the world. OK, we all know it has its grubby moments but you need to take the long view, like Mr Meldrum has done. Well done that man, someone give him a medal!!

Hand, Heart and Soul

2007-03-09T16:12:00.000Z

I'm working my way through the above book, about the Scots Arts & Crafts Movement of the late 19th century and found the following quoted on the frontispiece. (Now there's a word).

"Now, to you who hope to become craftsmen, or designers, or both, and as such deal with what are sometimes called the lesser arts, I would say for your encouragement, that these are the very arts which lie nearest the hand, and nearest the heart also of all people, inasmuch as they deal with the plenishing of the home, and the surroundings of everyday life: of those very things which are seen and used, and familiarly touched and handled, each hour of the twenty-four... To the craftsmen, the importance only of outward form andthe mechanical nicety and finish of his work, may readily come to hold undue place, till, in th end, he is in danger of forgetting that there is a spiritual truth, a reach of soul as well as a reach of hand."

From a lecture 'On the application of Art to Industry' give by the architect James a. Morris in Ayr, October 1904.

Light in the darkness - or at least in the fog - of post-modern sexuality

2007-03-06T22:38:00.000Z

Wow. After the mad frenzy of the wedding fair (more on that tomorrow, promise) I had a couple of thoughts going around. One was 'Why the heck did I do that?' and the other was 'Am I wrong to say that I won't make certain kinds of corset? Who am I to judge what other people do in thei private lives?'.

No matter how much I tried, I just couldn't square the idea of taking your clothes off in front of other people - no matter what the music is, who the crowd is, what kind of clothes you (were) wearing - with a happy, peaceful and quiet soul. Not for me. I couldn't even imagine making a corset for people to take off! I don't know, I got a spidey-sense tingle in my 'core' somewhere near my heart that said "Warning" Stay away!" Not that I think I would immediately lose faith or become some kind of louche lotus-eater but it's the dangerous drip-drip, like water dissolving stone..

Anyway, long story short: I know of a couple of good Orthodox female writers - Matushka Donna Farley who tends more towards the fantasy end of the spectrum (more on her later) and Matushka Frederica Matthewes-Green , or Mama Fred as she is affectionately known. It's rare to come across someone who is so capable of committing common sense, faith, humour and intelligence in writing on such a spread of issues. I wondered if she had written anything about the subject of burlesque, which is currently becoming very popular here in Scotland. Nothing specific came up, but I did read a short essay called "What to say at a Naked Party" (Go home! seems like a good start)... Anyway, she concludes with this and it just seemed too good not to quote, given how often I have tried to explain to non-Christians the relationship between God, sin, sinners and judgement.

"God hates sin like the parent of a leukemia victim hates cancer."

And a skein of cherry-coloured twist...

2007-02-23T19:27:00.000Z

I am currently up to my eyes, metaphorically and physically, with preparations for next weekend's wedding fair. Bad timing in terms of Lent but at least it gets things out of the way in time for the weddings I am lucky enough to be working on in May. More on that anon, and perhaps in another blog...

Anyway, here is a picture of one of my corsets in the window of a hairdressers, which was once a corset makers (around 1835, according to records) and is now full of my corsets, once again. I might also get to hang some pictures there once I have photographs taken of my work.

The title of the post is from one of the most enchanting books I read as a child - "The Tailor of Gloucester". Little did I realise that I would, in years to come, sit near my own window, legs crossed and shoulders aching, to get the fine handwork that I really enjoy doing accomplished. I'd recommend a visit to this site, as well as reading the book, since the old pieces of textile, including real waistcoats, were drawn with such accuracy by Miss Potter that they can be identified in the V&A archives. That's the topic of a whole other post, after next weekend!

Caspar David Friedrich - Moonwatching

2007-02-08T21:56:00.000Z

I hope you enjoy this - CDF is one of my favourite German painters, his paintings full of mystery, religious symbolism, atmosphere and unexplained narrative. Why are this man and woman out at night? Where have they been and why are they standing still, for this second, to gaze at the moon? I love making up their story and imagining lives I'll never know any more about than this one moment.

Bloo-ooo Moooon!

2007-02-08T18:14:00.000Z

I meant to do this post last week but... well, three weeks to the wedding show, miles of work to do and yet another day has been eaten up with admin. I don't even work in an office! I suppose even I have to do paperwork sometimes but I swear, the whole day has been phone calls, emails, yadda yadda. Anyway: driving home from meeting a lovely new client in Fife last week, I saw this type of moon hanging low over the horizon - so big and full and near then far. Awe inspiring and very Casper David Friedrich. More on him later, but next time you see that kind of moon, just whisper "CDF" and join a very exclusive club of us, people who appreciate real Romantic painting!

Penn Jillette

2007-02-02T09:57:00.000Z

Ever a fan of mr Gaiman and a regular reader of his blog, he has asked his readership to add 'Penn Jillette' as a surprise/freak-out for his friend, Penn Jillette. He only has to ask once!

"It is a truth universally acknowledged...

2007-01-24T18:53:00.000Z

... that a single man in possession of a good fortune must be in want of a wife."

I am currently hand-sewing (smacks forehead) my first regency gown, a white spotted muslin from round about 1810 and based on various examples in my favourite costume books. Since it was dragging just a tad, hand-seaming the bodice with stitches no more than two needle-widths apart and one needle-depth down, I decided to put on the original, and best, "Pride and Prejudice" with Firth, Ehle et al. What bliss! Time I think to start a new blog, purely for sewing.... more anon.

Why I'd rather take my chances in a banger*

2007-01-20T20:49:00.000Z

*Brit slang for an old, disreputable and rather tatty car.

Ahem: yes, the reason for this post - which is kind of about making your life more beautiful by making it a) longer and b) more pleasant is that the rather big hire car provided for us by the insurance deal is making me ill. Nauseous. Green about the gills. etc etc etc. At first I thought it was the vicious braking system installed in all new cars - they seem to have thought sensors which mean there is little difference between "huh, there's a car I'd better slow down" and "oops, slammed on the brakes". Nope.

Turns out that it is my hyper-aware - and life-saving - schnozz. According to this Independant article the smell is actually a cocktail of toxic chemicals! Woah! Add to that the insane amount of polish, aerosol and general rubbish that showrooms use - or worse, one of those stupid scented trees - and you have a mobile toxic pod, designed to make those of us whose bodies are quite good at communicating danger via the digestive system very unpopular with our less sensitive brethren.

The good news is, we are not alone and NO, it is not all in our heads! Go on, feel smug and buy an old banger...

And an update

2007-01-15T17:13:00.000Z

well, you know how sometimes you try to do the right thing, which may not be the strictly abiding by rules set out for you kind of thing, so you can help someone out? Well, that's where I was and now I'm not. The doofus who rammed my van on Saturday is now claiming my doors were already buckled (uh, hullo? how on earth did I manage to lock them then???) and whined to me /and/ my mechanic about the cost of the repairs. I don't think so.
He's been reported to the police and my insurance company who are now going to pursue him entirely legally. Yes I feel bad but no, it's not my fault. I did try...

Alas poor van!

2007-01-15T10:00:00.000Z

Yes, the van was hit by another car on Saturday night but no, I am not writing it off. I'm going to take an alternative route to the usual "claim on the insurance" one. The guy who hit me has offered to pay cash to the garage and, although I do have a stiff neck and don't want to drive to Glasgow alone on WEdnesday now, I hardly think that qualifies as a personal injury. (it is SO sore!)

Why? Lemme see... because insurance companies charge people lots of money and then use any excuse to charge them more? because I hate the way people exaggerate their injuries (the achey-neck type) to get money from said companies, putting up everyone elses premium costs? because I don't want this guy, who could be a bad driver but could maybe have been unlucky, to lose his job because he can't afford to reinsure his private hire car? because it just feels wrong?

Anyway: I'm going to get a quote from the garage this morning and see how I feel - I just think if everyone who was unhappy with the system refused to participate, they'd get the idea pretty sharpish.

Stuck!

2007-01-10T19:31:00.000Z

Okay, this is going to be short and bitter, like bad espresso. I have got to finish cleaning my house. I don't mean, whizz round with a vaccuum and dust, I mean throw out a bunch of stuff, sort out a bunch of stuff and spend a good day tidying it so that I can a) move freely over the floor and b) get on with urgent stuff like the three outfits I need to make for my publicity photographs and wedding show, approaching with speed. This isn't hard: it's mainly a picking up and throwing or putting exercise but I am - again - completely stuck and spent this afternoon knitting bootees and watching Dickens rather than doing something useful, like sorting out my workroom, which looks like the tasmanian devil from Bugs Bunny just passed through. No joke in a room the size of a wardrobe.

Any (polite) suggestions on how to get through it? Nah? oh well. Here's a funny picture so it doesn't get too depressing, even in the middle of January. Proves VPL and women wearing fashion when it doesn't suit them is nothing new!

The Lamp of the Soul

2007-01-08T15:46:00.000Z

Here are two icons that I saw in Greece about seven years ago (yikes) and which in different ways I think are wonderful. The first, a fresco from the now deserted city of Mystras, shows Christ holding the Gospel in his left hand and blessing with the other. Although there is a lot of damage to the surface of the paint, the balance of blues, composition of the figure and other features as well as calm, serene expression still visible on the face mean you can see 'past' the missing pieces. The second is very new - I have not been able to find out yet who made it but it can be seen in the exonarthex of the Church of the Panagia at the Monastery of Osios Loukas, not far from Athens (well, a couple of hours isn't that far!). Although the monastery is famous for the exquisite mosaics which decorate the main Church and the relics of Holy Luke himself, this is a modern icon in a church which is over 1000 years old. That alone is awesome. The icon is about three and a half feet high, the lower half protected by glass - which in those pre-digital days meant the flash made a mess of the close up pictures - and I think I stood in front of it for about ten minutes hardly able to breathe. It's not that I was impressed with the technique, the materials, the size of it - at that time I knew absolutely zero about icons or how they were made. All I could see was the expression in their eyes, the love that seemed to pour out of the icon. As I said, it stopped me in my tracks.

I don't suppose the photograph captures that but if you ever get the chance, be sure to visit the monastery yourself.

El Laberinto del Fauno - or Pan's Labyrinth

2007-01-01T14:07:00.000Z

Drop whatever you are doing, in the post-Nativity, post-New Year/Feast of St Basil fog that you may be doing and run, fast as you can, until you find a cinema that is showing Pan's Labyrinth.

Banish all thoughts of David Bowie and Jim Henson from your mind and instead, imagine the Spanish Civil War, Grimm's Fairy Tales and the reality of good, evil and the supernatural that many of us lose we grow 'up'.

I don't want to say too much: the site is awesome, especially Guillermo del Toro's sketchbook (wow!) and is careful not to give anything away. Me neither. Suffice to say that after four days, the film is still very much in my head, the images are still sharp and the ending, oh... the ending.

BTW, this isn't a children's film. If you don't like squidgy violence there are about three moments when you'll have to take your glasses off or avert your gaze but they are very short and not at all the kind of thing you should allow to prevent you seeing this.

What are you still there for? Go on!! Oh, and Happy New Year. More on that in the next post.

A Spell for the Refreshment of the Spirit

2006-12-21T17:24:00.000Z

I don't know about you but this time of year, my spirit is flagging just a little. Then, just in time, Matushka Donna Farley decides to start a blog about books which remedy just that predicament. Check it out now at A Spell for Refreshment of the Spirit. She's a Lewis fan as well as a writer, so go check it out and suggest your own revivivifying reading.

My-oh-my Michelangelo and I

2006-12-19T19:48:00.000Z

just sitting by the train tracks reading kafka to the sky...

I defy you to not get this stuck in your head for days. Weeks even.

Drawbacks of the new programme #1

2006-12-18T18:22:00.000Z

Apparently I can't post directly from YouTube any more: that is a pain. However, I'm going to go ahead and do it the old fashioned way, cutting and pasting the links - why? Because (and I hate starting a sentence with a conjunction, conditional or otherwise) you, dear reader, are worth it. Even if you never leave a comment. Not one. mumble bumble mumble :-)

Pretty Things

2006-12-14T14:37:00.000Z

I like pretty things, especially pretty clothes. The older the better. This means I can't wear them but that doesn't stop them being pretty. Viz:

These are all items on display in the Kelvingrove Museum - I like the way they're at eye-level and in cases which aren't so large you don't get to smoosh your face up close and see the lovely detail.

Glasgow Redux

2006-12-13T10:26:00.000Z

To move swiftly on from my recent DIY efforts - more anon - here are some more pretty pictures from Glasgow, specifically the Kelvingrove Museum.

And the moral of the story is...

2006-12-13T10:23:00.000Z

Stop painting when you get /this/ tired. You know it's right.

Glasgow is a very strange place...

2006-12-11T08:36:00.000Z

Especially if you're from Edinburgh. Anywhere that your great-grandmother tells you is "full of cut-throats and murderers" can't be good, can it? Not having set foot in the place until I was a teenager and even then, only going through for gigs and the occasional getting lost on the M9/8 (honest) I can't claim to know it. However, John and I visited Kelvinside the other week and saw the Kibble Palace - a glorified greenhouse with alabaster statues, humid dark green pools and elaborately fronded palms (that came out as 'psalms', how Orthodox...) and then the re-titivated Kelvingrove Museum. They tidied it up, dusted it down and mixed up the exhibits. The result is a rather nifty combination of objects, including my favourite so far - a blue silk pelisse from about 1810 and a few pretty mantua and robes from the earlier 18C.... They did have a video with a lady getting dressed and her corset was AWFUL: all wrong, laced badly and it did NOT fit. Grrrrr. So, to illustrate our trip and keep this blog moving, I'll be putting pictures up, in between painting our last room, the spare 'Ooom, before Christmas. What /WILL/ I do with myself once the house is finished???

On with the show! First up, the Kibble Palace. Top comment made by a small boy to his grandad, on entering the "Killer Plant" room (with Venus Flytraps etc) "but Grandad, are you SURE they don't eat people too?"...

I will chant to my God as long as I have any being...

2006-11-21T19:38:00.000Z

Life at the choir stand can be rough sometimes. In the middle of thinking "Why don't I just walk away from it?" I found this, written by the Abbess Thaisia in her "Letters to a Beginner"You can find the whole text of the letter, which goes into great detail and is both awe-inspiring as well as comforting at the same time, here.

"You have begun to sing in the choir; therefore, you glorify the Lord in the image of the heavenly hosts, who ceaselessly sing praise to the glory of their Creator and Lord. How fortunate you are! But do you acknowledge the full sacredness and importance of this godly work, which incomparably more than any other work is worthy to be called godly work? If not, then it is not superfluous to remind you of the threatening and terrible words of the Prophet: Cursed is the man that doeth the work of the Lord carelessly (Jer. 48:10). You see to what a terrible accountability those are liable who negligently and carelessly perform the work of serving God. The chanter (or singer) is the mouth of the Church, i.e., of the society of believers who are praying in church; while singing prayers and hymns, he pronounces them not only for himself, but in the name of all who are present in church, and as all who are praying pronounce their prayers through the mouths of the singers, these last also are the mouth of the Church. Chant unto our God (Ps. 46:7), the Holy Church invites them, but chant ye with understanding (Ps. 46:9). Consider and take heed: of Whom do you sing, to Whom do you pray, before Whom do you stand? You stand before the One before Whom the angelic ranks stand and walk with fear, covering their faces! You sing praises to the One of Whom all the heavenly powers ceaselessly proclaim: Holy, Holy, Holy, Lord of Sabaoth! Understand how high the work of the chanter is. Understand and admire the mercy of God, Who allows even earthly sinners to bring praise to Him! This heavenly work is the work of an angel and not of a man having unclean lips, as the holy Prophet Isaiah expressed, having heard heavenly singing: Woe is me, for I am pricked to the heart; for being a man, and having unclean lips, I dwell in the midst of a people having unclean lips (Is. 6:5). And you, infirm, weak, and sinful, have been entrusted with such a great work. This talent which has been entrusted to you by the Lord, is a talent which you must bring forth and increase by employing it with understanding. With all humility and fear towards God say mentally to your soul: Behold, my soul, the Master entrusts thee with a talent: receive His gift with fear; and thou hast heard the condemnation of him who hid his talent, O my soul: hide not the word of God, but proclaim, sing of His glory, increase the gifts of grace entrusted to thee, and thou shalt enter into the joy of thy Lord (Stichera on Lord, I have cried and on Lauds, Great and Holy Tuesday)."

2006-11-14T20:36:00.000Z

Quick Change Artists on America's Got Talent

Further proof that there is more in heaven and on earth than I, at least, have dreamed of. I don't know how they do it, I don't need to, I just think it's GREAT. Not beautiful but what larks Pip, what larks!

2006-11-14T19:18:00.000Z

Helsinki Complaints Choir

I found this wonderful - nicely sung choral music that's relevant to (almost) everyone I know. You really do want to watch this one, honest.

2006-11-10T16:31:00.000Z

It's getting cold here now: cold, windy, wet, leaves flying off of trees at alarming speed and it's dark by, oh, 4.30 in the afternoon. Very soon, I'll start to think of Christmas presents - and people will start to ask me what I'd like myself. This year, we have a new member of the family, my brother and his wife having adopted Katrina. They are very happy and grateful for the chance to share their lives with her. Lots of my friends have also had babies this year - pictured here is Eirini, owner of the biggest smile this side of the Bosphorus. (although I admit she's looking rather serious in this one).

So when people ask me what I would like this year, I think I'll be suggesting they make a donation to Hope for Grace Kodindo a charity dedicated to improving maternity care in Chad, one of the world's worst countries for maternal mortality. 40% of women in Chad have babies before their 17th birthday and the average lifespan of a woman is only 40. Pre-eclampsia, a condition which kills perhaps two or three women in the UK per year, killed 20 women per month at the main hospital in the capital - or it did, until this charity found donations of magnesium sulphite which is a form of Epsom salts...

For less than £5, you can save a woman's life. That is what I'd like for Christmas.

p.s.

2006-10-26T16:25:00.000+01:00

I should add that the previous photo is even fuzzier than the icon itself, so it looks a bit out of focus. No idea why that should happen, but here's a slightly different image which is also slightly clearer. Weird, huh?

Saint Luke - a new icon

2006-10-26T16:14:00.000+01:00

Here, for your viewing, is my latest icon. My second, in fact. The icon is on an inch-thick panel of tulip wood, traditionally gessoed over linen, water gilded (badly) and then painted with egg tempera, using earth and semi-precious stone pigments, e.g. lapis lazuli. The scrolls show the first verses from the Evangelist's Gospel and the Acts of the Apostles, translation the NJKV (Orthodox Study Bible). I have used a script style that is based on Greek icons but in English, so that it is legible to most of us here in the UK.

It is the first time for many things on this icon: furniture, drapery, water gilding (and what an arcane skill that is), painting on top of gold, inscribing a halo, script - the only thing I have done before, really, are the flesh parts and even then, Saint Silouan was a much older and ascetic saint. Saint Luke is shown here as a vigorous man in the prime of his life, hence the bright and 'youthful' qualities.

I hope that in a while I'll be able to look on this as an icon, rather than something that I made mistakes on but since I'm a perfectionist that may take a little while. In the meantime, I hope that you like it (Thomas!) and that you all had a wonderful Feast of St Luke last week.

A New Adventure

2006-09-15T08:45:00.000+01:00

OK, so this isn't strictly beautiful - but it's appropriate. We leave in a few hours for another trip to the wilds of the Welsh border, Shropshire, where men drink beer and career down the street in rubbish bins pushed by their whooping friends and there is NO mobile phone coverage and NO digital TV. Four channels. Gulp.

Anyway, the point of this self-imposed exile is all in aid of my icon painting/writing. Here is the very first one I've done, now complete with all its errors and mistakes (play nice people) but finished. When I come back, I will have a new icon of Saint Luke, complete with gilding! Now that's worth a week with four channels...

Sympathy for ...

2006-09-13T09:42:00.000+01:00

those in Hell. I know, it's a weird one.

I freaked myself out last night watching BBC's "Crimewatch" programme, which described some of the most awful crimes you can imagine. I won't go into detail but it made me seriously reconsider going anywhere on my own or even opening the door. I know, it was that bad. On top of the aching pain for the victims, their families, the frustration of those seeking to find and punish the perpetrators, fury at the hate within those who committed the crimes etc., I felt complete bewilderment at how any human could act towards another human in that way.

Later on I was mulling over what C.S. Lewis wrote about people from Hell having a coach trip to Heaven and being so bored, they wanted to go back to Hell. He also wrote that the door to Hell is locked from the inside. Seeing the glory of God, giving Him praise and love for eternity, being within His presence had no joy for them - in fact, according to Lewis, it repelled them.

I realised that not only was this a reponse to seeing God clearly, it was a habit they had developed in their earthly life. They had lived their entire lives in hell (on earth), had not listened to God's call to look beyond this life and so could not move beyond that kind of existance when they died.

And then it hit me - they deserved pity. Even the evil, depraved, awful ones who did the type of terrible crime that has me scared even in the bright light of this autumn morning. They are like people who have lived their whole lives in a coal mine and, when led into the sunshine decide that they prefer the stinking, wet, cold and miserable dark because not only are they used to it but it hides the deeds they don't want others to see. God is not only Light but Clarity - the closer we come to Him the more clearly we see our sins and, without faith in His Mercy and Love, we can't bear how awful we can be. The temptation is, of course, to feel smug about how we've realised we are sinful etc., but that is just as bad and, easy though that would be, real repentance is humble but not obsessive. (and the queen of OCD should know that one...)

This understanding is, I think, to help me pray for those who've done harm to others, a task that is not easy when confronted with the consequences of their actions.

Apart from praying for others, how do I deal with my own sinfulness and lack of love? Quite simply, as Saint Silouan said "Keep your mind in Hell, and despair not."

Dormition at Shepherd's Law Hermitage

2006-08-28T18:01:00.000+01:00

A wind-blown, sun-dappled Northumberland hillside with clouds breaking the blue, a chapel built through prayer and patience by one man who loves God and God in every man, fellowship with Christians of many varieties and a blessed Feast accompanied by a memorial for my dear friend and the departed monk, Father Cuthbert. Okay, it's a 160 mile round-trip - a long way for me - and it takes a whole day but goodness me it's worth it. If I believed in reincarnation, I'd want to be a small creeping thing or animal that got to live up there for it's short lifetime, so I could worship there every day. It was interesting too that in the middle of a daydream about all that peace and quiet and how perfect my life would be there, I remembered what Aidan had told me about finding peace in the middle of a busy life. Prayer is essential to our lives: the source of true prayer is to be found in the heart. Within the heart we have a special place, the door through which we can find God. Within the heart, within that even smaller space, within God, we emerge again into the world, the universe, the cosmos. Not only do we have the ability to have God within our hearts, we carry the world there too, within Him. All that is a long way of saying - God is with us, understand all ye nations - and so are those far from us, in this world or the next.

Memory Eternal Father Cuthbert, one year on.

Welcome Eirini Tsolaki

2006-08-25T17:28:00.000+01:00

Say hello to Eirini, latest member of the Tsolakis family. She's only two weeks old but has quite a character, thankfully peaceful as you'd expect from her name. Everyone is doing well and I can't wait to see if she's as funny and intelligent as her sister.

"The Historian" by Elizabeth Kostova

2006-08-21T21:10:00.000+01:00

I took this to read while on a course in Oxford: I need something to absorb me when away from home so I still have my literary "happy place" with me. It's not often I buy a book recommended by the bookshop but something about the combination of a vampire-academic-travelogue type of tale appealed.

A nameless author (see 'Rebecca' by du Maurier), a difficult journey into an exotic country (see 'Dracula' by Bram Stoker) and a description of the results of the Ottoman-Byzantine clash (see 'From the Holy Mountain' by William Dalrymple) are all suggested in this book - so why doesn't it read as derivative? Because she has taken existing themes and motifs but succeeded in combining them into something new and gripping. No rock-star motorbike riding vampires here, rather a menacing presence, a thief of freedom and tyrant who seeks to control those who explore and study.

I was rather disappointed when a reviewer on TV gave away a significant part of the plot so won't repeat it here. I can't think of anything to criticise, beyond a wish to know the main narrator better especially in the last third of the book when the pace is perhaps a little frustrating. This is, I think, intentional: we are left desperate to proceed, to get through bureaucracy and detail to find what our travellers seek, so don't let that put you off.

The two things I enjoyed most (geographical and architectural descriptions aside) were the extreme layering of stories and voices: at one point I think we are listening to a story through four different stories, if not five. It is not confusing or muddled in spite of that - I felt more like a swimmer who dives through different temperatures of water or,in a much nicer analogy, as though I was taking a bite from a very large layered cake...

The other interesting theme is the efficacy of good - whether it is moral right, religious rituals and symbols. the truths inherent in folk belief and supersition or simply the power embodied in simple love (both agape and eros) - against a universal evil which could be embodied in a state or undead individual. Perhaps it's something I always look for, perhaps it's something I particularly enjoy but it's here. It's not, however, that the power of good always prevents those events which make us weep or sometimes despair, rather that it can prevent them being worse than we feared or can even transform them.

So, go, read it and make sure you don't go picking up books that you didn't ask for.

To name a thing is to call it into being.

2006-08-11T22:47:00.000+01:00

Said a very erudite Egyptian, at some point in the past. I'm quite sure that other religious groups will have a similar view - indeed "Speak of the Devil (and he'll appear)" is along the same lines.

Since we've got that out of the way, can I suggest you stop by and visit Baby Name Wizard where one can discover that in 2005, Nehemiah was ranked 466. What I love most is how random and unexplained the numbers are - arcane mathemetics is the only kind I'm interested in.

Geoffrey Chaucer Hath a Blog

2006-08-08T06:15:00.000+01:00

Surely the reason that one day God decided to allow the internet to appear: the real thing of beauty in the blogosphere. I read this with a mixture of awe, amusement and geeky smugness (since I know what they're saying). Go on, buy a t-shirt too, you know you want to. Geoffrey Chaucer Hath a Blog Oh, and it makes you look REALLY smart when you know who Gower was...

The Spanish Friar

2006-08-06T11:39:00.000+01:00

There is pleasure sure in being mad which only madmen know.
Dryden, the Spanish Friar Act III, Scene iv.