Tuesday 23 February 2010

One I Got & One That Got Away

toby_loves_charley

I was in London at the weekend, staying close to Kew Gardens. There’s an Eco Village there, on the corner of Kew Bridge and some-road-or-other. Personally, if I wanted to live in an eco village I think I’d pick somewhere quieter and where the air doesn’t taste of diesel fumes, but it’s a squatters encampment and good use of what will some day become several million pounds worth of luxury apartments, so best of luck to the squatters. There’s a facebook page here and a YouTube video here. Great use of global new media to promote a true grass-roots movement.

I walked past the Eco Village a few times and as always I kept my eyes open for hearts, but amongst the various graffiti nearby there were none. AND THEN. Driving away on Sunday morning there were two brand new bits of graffiti – a huge ‘Long Live the Eco Village’ and a lovely heart on the gate…. and me sitting in the passenger seat of a car belching diesel, stuck in traffic, about to hit the M3 back to the fresh air and quiet of Dorset.

So can I ask you a favour? If you live near or in the Kew Eco Village, can you take a peek on the gate and see if the heart is still there? Maybe take a picture… and then when you want a new place to set up an eco-village, how about the old Grammar School site in Swanage?

What I do have to show you is this: a heart from the shore at Osmington Mills. And look at that sandstone! What I love about sandstone is the fact that you can see sand dunes from millions of years ago, touch them, rub them and free sand that’s been trapped for millennia. It’s like being God. In a very small way.

And the Smugglers Inn at Osmington is one of the loveliest pubs I know, so that’s a plus. The rock this was on is precisely here.

love | landscape

Sunday 14 February 2010

happy valentines day

dom_loves_karen_4_eva

Every day of the year should afford the opportunity to tell somebody how much you love them, but that isn’t always the way it works. Today is important because it provides the opportunity to make a romantic and possibly foolish gesture, safe in the knowledge that if it goes horribly wrong all will be forgiven because that’s just what crazy, love-struck fools do on Valentine’s Day.

What’s odd is when you are snug and safe within a relationship and yet still you’re expected to make that additional gesture just because it’s The Most Romantic Day of the Year. I spend my life making pictures with hearts in them, to the point where Vicki should have lost interest in the universal symbol of romance. Last year we agreed a few days before not to get each other anything for Valentine’s Day. Come the morning, I found a card and a gift on my pillow when I brought in the coffee. I felt mean and unromantic and thoroughly caught out.  “And what did Swanage’s Most Romantic Man get his lovely wife for Valentine’s Day?” a friend asked a couple of days later. I explained. “You didn’t fall for that one?” he said in astonishment, amazed that I could be so foolish.

So if you think you may find yourself in a similar pickle in future years, I hereby give you permission to bookmark this site ready to rush to your PC, pick a heart from here to print out and make into a hasty card. It might help, it might not, but it’s just a suggestion and it’ll look as though you were planning a cool and artsy hand-made card for ages…

[the picture above was taken on a lovely autumn day in 2009 on Swanage Beach. The big red thing is on the end of a groyne down there. I didn’t Google ‘red thing on the end of a groyne’ just in case, but I assume that they mark the end of the groyne should the sea be particularly high and hiding the structure from boats coming into shore. A probable sounding factoid for you there.]

love | landscape