A Blog - Sandra's blog

Today 30/9/2018

I'm starting a one hour habit rule by two. First thing in the morning is my writing - one hour at 6am.

My next session is at 7pm. I will work on my hobby of restoring dolls.

These hours are for no one else but for me to complete projects I have started.

I am well on my way to completing story of James, a young man experiencing life and death in the late nineteen forties. James is honest, a hard worker and has lived his early life making it through the Great Depression. What we see with James is how he survives the war years, how he maintains dignity and integrity at the hands of the Japanese and what happens to his relationships.

While doll collecting might seem to be on the opposite spectrum to novel writing they have an important conncetion. That connection is history. The more I collect the more background I find to my dolls.

Mostly this blog will be short because my time will be spent on my two habits.

The soldier doll and the rag doll are carnival dolls from the 1940s.

Last year was a tough year with Ken's kidney failure and subsequent kidney transplant.

It's now 2019. I have struggled to make writing a daily habit but I have increased my writing time.

Today's effort:

5/01/2019, Thoughts on an egg yolk.

On the floor, in the living-room, I see him, a distorted body on the floor, without movement. There is no breath. Alongside side him is a raw splattered egg on a side plate, on the floor. Stuck in my mind are the words, 'What comes first the chicken or the egg.' Ludicrous, I know, but the image rattled me. Here, splattered before me, was death before living-before the chicken hatched. I look on, mourn the passing of a golden life, as if the sun fallen from the sky spilt its blood on a plate. I could gather the egg. I could funnel the messiness back in its shell. I could glue the fragility together but it is too late. The smell of decay will begin. I am reminded of my mortality. I take a snap, a reminder of brokenness-in a life full of snaps.