Beauty in Decay - 21st July 2018

Mindful journeying?

I am stopped in my tracks. On my journey through the orchard everywhere I turn I see beauty in decay. Like my age, this way of seeing things has crept up on me. It’s my sixtieth birthday next month. It feels as if I’ve blinked and decades have stormed past.

Earth energy

Bramble roots call me. Their wizened characters wise beyond words. Years of flexing forcefully through rich boulder clay has contoured and created their shapes. The vigour of the wild blackberry is rooted in its concentrated earth energy – frequently a bulbous ball of fibrous matter.

The return of the Bramble Root

Today I met a doleful dragon mooching around the margins of Xylia – the compost heap named after the wood dweller fairy. Like me the decaying dragon is on a journey towards reincarnation. I hope my journey will be longer than hers is likely to be! And maybe that is what prompts my wish to give her a second life as a work of Art?

Art as legacy?

Am I seeking to extend my life through the creation of words and images? Is that what this run-up to embracing 60 is really about?

I pick up the baby dragon. My first instinct is to photograph her best side so I can introduce her to the wider world of social media. I want to preserve her image for posterity.

More that the eye can see?

Now, I am not a photographer, yet I frequently brandish my phone in the direction of decaying wood hoping to capture something of what I see. My results disappoint me, they don’t do justice to the three dimensional nature. Occasionally one surprises me. The lens captures more than I first saw, but isn’t that always the way?

The more attention I give something, the more it manifests. 

Think I need to stop there and leave you with a collection of photos from my foray today. If these musings touch you in any way please email me.

Brashwood repurposed into the sides of a raised bed