The Restory Retreat Centre

Photo by George Angus Covid-19 and 2020 are obviously now linked into eternity. But I’ll remember the winter of 2020 for my discovery of 2 things: -          A teapot cosy, and -          A hot water bottle Of course none of these are new inventions, or a novel product entering the market. It is not as if I’ve never seen it being used. Matilda has been preparing hot water bottles on going to bed for as long as I can remember and I grew up with a teapot cosy always somewhere in one of the drawers in the house. But during this winter everything changed. It became close and personal. As with most good things in my life, Matilda’s hand is quite prominent here as well.  On one particular cold morning, our 10h30 teapot appeared on the tray totally covered with a cosy (neither the spout nor handle could be seen). When I lifted that cover to pour our tea it was like the unveilin...

Photo by George Angus It could have been done  with one  tone of brown. Now, a spectrum  spreads  quilted in field, folded over hill. The  quiet abundance  of winter. George

My suster stuur vir my ‘n e-pos met interessante woorde wat basies onvertaalbaar is en net so in die oorspronklike gebruik word. Eintlik is dit leefstyle wat in woorde saamgevat word. Onder andere Hygge. Die Deense woord vir ‘n leefstyl wat koesterend, sorgsaam en intiem is. Wat vra dat jy die oomblik waarin jy is, hoe eenvoudig ook al, sal geniet en die waarde van “dit stadiger vat” nie onderskat nie. Ek sit ‘n lang ruk daarna en kyk. Is dit net iets in die lug, deel van die groter “collective consciousness”, of bloot ‘n nuwe gier? Iets wat deur stylghoeroes herontdek en afgestof is? Sy weet nie dat ek nou al vir byna 2 weke materiaal versamel oor Hygge nie. Aanhalings, foto’s, artikels. Ek het effens teruggehou omdat ek gedink het dit mag half onvanpas wees om hier aan die begin van die lente daaroor te skryf; Hygge is baie tuis in die winter kom dan tot sy of haar reg. Waarskynlik is dit waarom dit my reg van ...

“Who do you suppose carves canyons for the downpours of rain, and charts the route of thunderstorms That bring water to unvisited fields, deserts no one ever lays eyes on..?”                                   Job 38:25-26(The Message) Greyia sutherlandi Natal bottlebrush. At the start of spring, even before the rain, when everything is still dry and brown, remnants of winter, it blooms. Not timidly. Not obscurely. No! Loud shouts of red higher up the mountain across the river. Putting up their display in plain sight. Flaunting it. Red, red, red. Right on the lip of the cliffs, flower arrangements in mid-air. They keep so well in pots, last for days. If you can get to them. If you can lean over far enough, stretch your reach to i...

I love this ache. For too long I have felt nothing. But then, the Spark (See the post Caught in the amber ) . And now the Ache. What to do with all this beauty?! It drives me to distraction: A Rapunzel sun spinning wintry grass to gold; the textures and colourways of story book stone walls; Katryn's amber eyes; Mily's purr and silken weight on my lap; the single new purple flower on the rosemary bush; the Zaaihoek dam under a sapphire sky; salad greens on a simple white plate; the huge supermoon rising just beyond reach; the puffed and perfect fiscal shrike on the fence, the huge open roses of cabbage; the icy crispness in the air; the cattle's curly winter coats... The impossible beauty of the Zaaihoek dam in winter.  Photo by Matilda It's too much to handle. So I knit. In the colours and textures of this winter. Maybe to somehow catch it in a scarf, a cap, a pullover. I don't know. I should do more with this, but I'm not yet sure precisely what. So I kn...

After reading George's post yesterday, Feeling of all ordinary human life , I was reminded of a piece I wrote around the same time, five years ago, August 2008, that is. My youngest son was still in school, but other than that nothing much has changed. And winter still gets to me just as it did then. This year's jasmine galaxy against the bluest sky                                            Sometimes, there’s not a thing in my head that seems to be worthy of putting words to it. And sometimes there are things in my head that are much too abstract to envelope them in words and post them to where my consciousness can receive them and go: “Aah! So that’s what this is all about!”        Today seems to be one of those not-worthy-of-words days where I sit around inside my head, shifting restlessly from one un-noteworthy thing to the other: Washing ...

In December 2011 we experienced snow on a visit to  Prague Today being Winter Solstice in the Southern Hemisphere and therefore the shortest day(length of daylight) of Winter as opposed to the longest day of Summer up North, I feel like concocting something special to celebrate the season. Me celebrating Winter? I must be either evolving or moving towards enlightenment! But searching through my many folders of photographs today looking for something to paint (I’ve enrolled in a watercolor course starting Monday), I discovered, to my utmost delight, how the winter palette speaks to my heart. Also, what really grabbed my attention as I scanned the internet for some interesting facts about solstices, is the incredible design of this little speck of dust in the expanse of space we call home. "The June solstice occurs when the sun is at its furthest point from the equator. It reaches its most northern point and the Earth's North Pole tilts directly towards the sun, at abou...

Rietfontein in winter. Photo by Matilda The first real cold spell of winter is upon us. I've moved from the desk where I was sitting when I could no longer feel my fingers and am now sitting on the edge of my bed with the sun gently thawing me through the window pane.      Its a funny thing about South Africa: we have relatively short winters and in global terms they are rather temperate for most of the three month duration, with every now and again the arrival of a really cold spell that grips most of the country. It lasts for a day or three and then subsides, going back to cool at the most.      Sunny South Africa, right?! The problem however, is that our buildings, especially residential dwellings, are not built in such a way that they are energy efficient and the cost of electricity and fuel being what it is, we tend to almost freeze inside our homes.     We go outside in winter to warm up in the glorious winter sun! And our houses w...

Photograph by Derek Keats Earth, my dearest, oh believe me, you no longer need your springtimes to win me over....                                                                                                                   ~ Rainer Maria Rilke I could have kissed him. Really. It’s not as if he was handsome, or sent my pulse racing. It’s just that he, after I’ve delivered the rollers at the factory and he was walking me back to the bakkie, casually said: “I love winter.” I love people loving winter. The Gauteng winters. People living down in the Cape are not frowned upon when they talk in nostalgic tones about Cape winters. There it is more or less in vogue to love winter –...

Every now and again George remembers his duties as my personal muse and assigns me a writing exercise with themes that range from truly mediocre, like to write about who lives in my street, to spectacularly bizarre: the Queen's handbag being one I distinctly remember. Of course, he knows that I will find out, as I write along, that no theme is ever mediocre, but the writing makes it so. As beauty is in the eye of the beholder, mediocrity is often the shades we wear looking at the world around us. "Write about what you don't think about." I ignored the assignment for a bit. I usually do when I know it will take me places I might not find comfortable. In any case, writing about what I'm not thinking about will have me thinking about it, won't it? But yes, I know what he means. So let's see where this leads me. It really depends on the season, but in these glorious, golden, autumn days, and again in late spring, I don't think about climatic temp...