that bed

I slept on a carved narra wood daybed that my grandfather was born on with a solihia base that a little foam mattress sat on. It was the only thing that was constant in all our moves. It was the one thing that was mine when the walls of a new bedroom knew nothing of myhistory or had none of my secrets to keep.On nights the nightmares came, the bed allowed space for my little brother to keep me company when I couldn't bear to be alone. It was the bed secrets were shared on, the one I laid on when phone calls lasted seven hours or more, the bed my best friends and I sat on when we told our stories of our first kiss. It was the bed where I spent nights hiding under the covers reading my Sweet Valley High books and it was the bed that kept me safe when my heart was broken numerous times holding my tears in its comforting space.

And now it sits in my little girl's nursery waiting to create new memories for this little one to keep. It waits to hold her in its space as she grows with it, perhaps one day her long legs will reach the end of the bed. Mine never did. It waits to hold her as she laughs, cries, and dreams on it. And I'm sure it'll keep her secrets the way it has mine.

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on that one day in London

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The streets are bright and busy. The summer sun leaves shadows on the architecture, with buildings reflecting the rays before it begins to set at nine thirty in the evening. I cross Hyde Park Corner and decide to walk into the park instead of taking that bloody number ten bus down Kensington High street at rush hour. The skaters are out weaving their way on their roller blades down the path, mummies and nannies pushing their prams, people sitting out on the grass soaking in every inch of the rare sunshine we have been getting. The Serpentine glistens as the ducks flap their way across it. Should I keep walking? I stop for a 99 flake from a ice cream truck further down and feel like a little girl walking down through the park past Kensington Palace. I want to hold this moment forever. 

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Another summer day and I can’t wait to get out of this stuffy office as my desk piles up with purchase orders and invoices. I’m also tired from that long shift at the pub last night. Perhaps those two wind down large glasses of wine at one in the morning wasn’t a great idea. The back roads of Great Portland Street are lined with smokers and delivery vans as I walk towards Regents Park just for me to breathe in that ‘me’ time. A nice cigarette, my bacon and egg sambo and my music. Just for this hour. Thank goodness for this greenery in the middle of the city, an hour just to escape, an hour to pretend I am lying on the beach somewhere in the Mediterranean. Sleeves and trouser legs rolled up, as if my skin would brown with the London sunshine. Who was I kidding? But it felt good. And every person on their lunch break sitting on their own patch of green felt exactly the same way I did. 

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The streets are cold and misty, that crisp breeze gently wisps through my cardigan. Springtime tulips are coming out as I cross Brook Green park to catch my tube at Hammersmith station. The local Starbucks is packed but I stop for my chai soy latte, daydreaming while I watch people cross the broadway, each rushing to where they have to be. The pie shop next door whiffs its smell across the station. Should I stop for one? No time, have to get to class. Ah shit. I missed the train anyway. Bloody District line. Shouldn’t have gotten that latte.  

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My front door never felt so far away. It’s freezing. I bloody hate winter. Shit. I wore the wrong shoes. My toes feel like they are falling off. Fuck. I dropped my glove and now it is all wet. I shouldn't have taken them off on the tube. Dammit. I should have remembered to bring my umbrella to shield me from this pathetic excuse for snow. Why did I choose to live five blocks away from the tube station in the middle of Chiswisk? There aren’t even any buses to take me closer to my flat. Bloody Stanford Brook. Did I mention I hate winter? 

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That bottle of wine warms us up as we sit in Boheme Kitchen in the heart of Soho just before Christmas. V and I on our second bottle of some fabulous New Zealand Sauvignon Blanc.  The cinnamon smell from the mulled wine hovers throughout and my cheeks are flushed from the warmth in the pub. Are the heaters turned on too high? Or perhaps its the wine? We walk out as the cold stops my breath for a minute. It’s sharp but kind as the wine circulates my blood. I watch my husband and V skip down Old Compton Road, arm in arm, like a pair of old friends when in fact they just met. This is what it’s all about. This is what London is. It’s as if I’ve literally frozen and life moves amazingly fast around me, with traces of light following everyones footsteps. This is my London and I’m in it. And then I run down the road to catch up as we walk through the doors of Bar Soho to grab ourselves vodka mojitos in the middle of a winter evening that I actually love.

that shiny little ring

“She smiled and said with an ecstatic air: "It shines like a little diamond",

"What does?"

"This moment. It is round, it hangs in empty space like a little diamond....” 

Almost seven years ago, this one man sat across his cousin to choose that stone, still in its raw form to decide how to design the diamond that he would set in a white gold band to place on the finger of the girl he wanted to spend the rest of his life with. Almost seven years ago, he carried the box a million miles away to step under a mango tree and get down on one knee on New Years Eve to ask her to marry him.

That stone. That diamond.

When I would look at it, I would go back in time and remember how body escaped in happy sobs, how the tears ran down my face when I realised what was happening in that one moment under the mango tree. The sparkle in the stone would bring back the sparkle in our eyes when I said yes. The shine would bring back our auras on those special days during our engagement, when we sat preparing for the day that would bind our lives together. I always looked at it. Even after seven years. I thought I'd be looking at it forever.

But it wasn't just a stone. Nor was it just a diamond.

It meant that he picked me to be the one he wanted to spend the rest of his life with. It meant that he chose me. And it held our stories in its little kaleidoscope. So please excuse me for being materialistic as I grieve the loss of my stone as in this one instance, this particular material possession meant the world to me. As much as I know there are thousands of diamonds out there, I know that there was only one that was mine, the only one that he chose to put on my finger that one surreal evening. As much as a stone is replaceable, this one isn't and neither are the stories that were engraved into it.

The empty setting on my engagement ring doesn't look right. The hollow spot where that stone sat stares back at me. The metal looks lacklustre without its shine. It looks incomplete. My finger feels incomplete.

And I'm absolutely gutted.

Things i want to remember

He tells me everything is okay when he is told he can't have something. He likes to know that it's okay to not have something even if he really wants it. He knows humility. And he knows patience. 

He pulls my face with such force just to give me a butterfly and eskimo kisses.

He knows how to give love. He knows that his affection matters.

He seeks validation after discovering he has read a word perfectly. 

I want to remember our lunch dates. And our dinner dates too. 

I want to remember how his little feet stand perfectly next to mine. I can't believe they are over half of mine. 

His imagination is unimaginable, how he creates a world only he can understand.

I want to remember how his lower lip quivers when he gets upset, how his wet, long eyelashes enhance his big eyes. How he hides when he is embarrassed, how he doesn't like to show his emotions in front of other people but also how he is so transparent.

He loves to play his little blue guitar, he sings 'Yellow' word for word, and his eclectic taste in music has me listening to classical music on full blast on some mornings.

He has memorised the words to 'Don't Worry, Be Happy' and asks me to play it 20 times in one car ride and he bounces along to the beat as he sings along.

I want to remember his little fingers, his button nose, his little toes that are growing so quickly. 

He is so independent at just three years old, he likes to do things because he "can know how to do it".

I want to remember how I love him so much my heart overflows.

{inspired by Susannah Conway's Things I want to remember post}

when his movement made my heart flutter

I remember it like it was yesterday. 

And now it's coming up to almost three years.

This time three years ago,  I was getting ready for my life to change. 

And oh my, how it did.

two years ago

Yesterday, two years ago, we left London. The pictures above were of our last walk 

around one of my favourite cities.

Yesterday, two years ago, I bid goodbye to the place I struggled to call home. It was

only when I left that I realised deep in my heart London really became my home. 

Yesterday, two years ago, I cried  and rejoiced, embracing change but also dreading it.

It seemed like two years ago was only yesterday.

And oh, how I miss it so.

because i love architecture

 

I easily forget where my true passion lies. But then when I look back into my files from my third year lecture series at Chelsea College of Art and Design, I remember exactly when I fell in love with architecture. 

Mostly it is about the beginning stages, when everything is so raw, when the lines trace sketchbooks, blank pieces of tracing paper, or random paper napkins in coffee shops.Then it becomes about the stories behind it, behind why a building was created. And then comes the finished stage, where you see the written, sketched out stories in its material and complete structure within the landscapes. 

As much as my love for interior was embedded into my young heart, my love for architecture grew as we were taught aspects of it that I never knew existed. 

and now I fully understand (even if I already knew)  where my love for delicate lines and simple colour began....

that one moment

December 3 – Moment. Pick one moment during which you felt most alive this year. Describe it in vivid detail (texture, smells, voices, noises, colors). (Author: Ali Edwards)

I remember waking up that morning on the other island miles away from home. Hungover, upset and missing my family, I sat and had a ham and cheese omelette in a cafe around the corner from the hotel I was staying at with my friends. The air was cool and the sky was grey, with not one pocket of sunshine attempting to creep through the thick clouds.  It was quiet, the locals went about their business and I watched the island life creep past as they began their routine around me as I sat there with a pounding head eating my breakfast.

I went for a walk that took me to the end of the stretch of beach, a little girl and her mother were collecting shells, a toned woman was doing her yoga, an older man was jogging on the beach and me, well I was breathing in this moment that I knew would not last forever. The smell of the salty ocean was stronger than usual, the sand was damp and cold and not its usual powdery texture; it stuck to my legs as I sat watching the silver traces of light on the oceans surface. 

I don't know what it was that morning, whether it was the stillness and quietness of this grey morning on a tropical island or perhaps it was my emotional hungover state after a friends big birthday bash or perhaps it was the simple life that my eyes grasped that morning.

But in that moment, it all made sense and in that moment, I felt alive. 

Original post here.

dreams that never passed by

" We were full of the stuff that every dream rested
  As if floating on a lumpy pillow sky
Caught up in the whole illusion
That dreams never pass us by
Came to a tattoed conclusion
That the big one was knocking on the door
What started as a mass delusion
Would take me far from the place I adore ..... "

There was once a time where New York called my name. Its bright shiny lights

flickered with compelling notions, luring me with its fire. Its busy streets hummed

with a silenced noise, a constant drum of motion that beat through me, ricocheted

through me. The city grasped me into its splendour, its charm; it captivated me with

its secret potion.

I think I would have lived in a loft. I would have had facebrick exposed walls and

rustic wood floor paneling, uneven and unfinished. I would have had extra large

windows willowing with white sheer curtains and a fire escape outside where I

could have sat and watched the city's buzz ignite below me. Perhaps I would have

had mismatched vintage furniture that I would have rummaged through in one

of Brooklyn's flea markets. I would have had my easel set up in one corner by one

of my very large windows. And maybe I could have also had a reading corner

by the heating, with sunshine pouring into my living room as the winter blew its

freezing wind.

Perhaps I would have had this all. But I didn't.

So this is all a dream that I still dream of, a dream that I still hold in the palm of

my hands, a dream that I know I almost had. 

But it's okay. I like to dream, even if they never pass me by.

     

Photos courtesy of desire to inspire.

Bon Iver - Skinny Love

.uneasy.

Week four of Unravelling has me looking at memories, looking through old photos and reminiscing and then I find that my tummy starts churning with every London album I open up.
I miss the city, the fast paced hustle and bustle. I miss how you can take a turn into a park and feel like you have escaped from the city in a matter of minutes. I miss being able to walk everywhere. Oh, the walking… my heart aches for this. We could spend hours walking around the city without a destination, without a reason except to just walk. I miss the fact that things work, that people know what they are doing, that people understand what they are doing. I miss drinks at the pub, especially in the summer when people are chasing the sun in the beer gardens. I miss spring and autumn, where the air is crisp. I miss Tesco, Primark and H&M. I actually miss my tiny little flat, with it’s creaky floors and lack of space, I really do.

Guess life really is how it’s supposed to be. You miss the little things that made you happy. I wanted to leave so badly and here I am yearning for it.

London was good to me, how can I not miss it?

. because i love amsterdam .

On my computer, I have a ‘because’ folder. These are all my files of things I like, just simply ‘because’ I like them. So I thought I would extend it out onto my blog, after all this blog is a collection of all the things I like, love and get inspired by. Why not share it? After all, it may inspire someone else.

I fall in love with a lot of cities but Amsterdam embraced me back.

Its beautiful, it’s serene, it’s creative, it’s crazy.

Coffee shops line every alley, art galleries trace the outskirts of the main strip,  bikes and trams configure every road and then the network of canals that outline these streets bring some sort of calmness to the city, even in the red light district. Every time I went, I closed my eyes and pictured myself living there. I would travel through the city on a bike, with a basket on the front of course, whisk through every canal and know every shortcut of the city. With my eyes closed, I could paint my life in anyway I wanted in that city and I would dream away on how it could have been there, and in a way, I’m glad that it’s all I have. Sometimes memories, photographs and  dreams  are a little bit better than reality. 

 

Some of my favourite memories were made in this city.

.the past is strapped to our backs.

i think of London a lot. how it shaped me, how it moulded me, how it embraced me.
it gave me my husband. and it brought me my son. it provided me my strength as a person. it gave me my passion as an artist. it gave me lifelong friendships. it brought me lots of tears and oh so much happiness.

                  it’s my old life but my photos are there to remind me about it.
                  i miss it. i really do.