I happened first in a fish-scented, silver city.
On a good day it glistened: a rainbow slick of oil on a mermaid’s tail, every shard of mica shone.
Mood altering on a whim, iron-hued granite radiating foreboding.
I remember walking hand in hand with my mum, peeking at washing lines and gardens through pale-blue, wrought iron-work guarding the bridge.
Seeing the road where later I would get tired and wail, tempted along only by the lure of a toy shop full of Britain’s animals.
Then on to my Gran’s. Polmuir road – church on the corner- watching birds nest in the branches of the tree on its perimeter.
Careering down the hill on my big red tricycle, ribbons coming untied….to a fantastical park, carved creatures for clambering, acres of glasshouses brimming with monstrous cacti, gargantuan succulents, budgies flocking, then onto playgrounds, pineapple cake and home for tea, prevailing tantrum north-easterly.
Creative Journey
The question ‘where are you from?’ requires reflection: does it relate to my people, my past or my place?
This memory-map?
Place.
But which one?
We moved…then I kept moving, place I was born? Or place I sensed belonging?
Then I got asked to go tell stories to folk from my Grandparent’s era, near their old house -reminiscence project.
Time to draw, before place transferred from memory to reality.
Train rolling North-Westerly coast-side, sketching, writing.
Thoughts reeling around an axis of scented colour…
Once done I tracked paths, some had moved, but then that’s their nature.
Moved, not lost.