Hello again Rob.
You have that restlessness of a heart looking for its home. I recognise it well. It raises questions of where we really fit in, of where we feel we belong. This takes some courage.
For me, after my home was thrown four feet or more in the air at close to 2G, I find I'm now looking for answers to those questions. Having a house damaged past what is worth repairing, but the possibility of a reasonable insurance payout, I can either move three hours south to where I have a lot of friends and fit in well but will have no income and freeze in winter, or I can stay here where I teach in some of the country's best schools, but become progressively more isolated and progressively more surrounded by bogans (look it up).
All that stuff sitting in my house. I can't take that with me at the end of my time in this world. But the memories of friends and acquaintances means something ineffable to me. As for the stuff, I now have a policy of use it or sell it.
So I think I'm going where my butt will freeze. I don't know how I'll contribute to that community, or how I'll get an income, but something will turn up. This was not quite the plan when I established the garden here and buried my departed pets in it you understand, but I think Plan B will work out.
Good luck with your varnishing. I see you are only an "r" from vanishing.
David
David,
I don’t really like to wear my heart on my sleeve, but the reality of my personal sitiuation is this: when my wife was alive this island was Paradise, in that together, we had it all and required no outside stimulus. With her gone, so has everything else that mattered, and photography is the only thing left with which to fill or kill time.
I never was much of a landscape sort of guy, and though I quite enjoy looking at good examples of the genre, I simply don’t feel I have any real aptitude for doing it myself. It’s not about technique or gear, it’s about soul, and mine wanders in other spaces. Maybe that’s why I can’t see it as art. And since landscape is pretty much all I can find here, the only real alternative to going slowly nuts is to get the hell out. But, the place is surrounded with crisis-prompted property sales, and nothing moves. Also, I have two kids, and as I want to leave them something other than memories, I need a good price.
I hope you choose the right option for yourself. I know that warmth (climate) is very important and that long periods of winter and lack of sunlight are harmful to the mind, as this winter in Mallorca, but we can’t always find the perfect combination in life, and when we do, I realise it doesn’t last for ever. Maybe grabbing on to what is possible is the best we can do – the only thing we can do.
I wish you good fortune.
Rob C