NOTES AND NOSTALGIA

I had a strange epiphany this week. I had an engineer over and the electricity was turned off while he worked the live wires. I knew this but still within about 45 seconds of him telling me I went to turn the light switch on and was surprised when it didn’t respond. So I tutted and said out loud to myself how silly I was. Then I thought oh I’ll sit down and catch up on that last bit of this TV programme that I love watching on my own. Stealing some me time in the middle of the day and feeling weirdly overindulgent about it. Then I thought you know what, I’ll make a lovely coffee while I have this enforced quiet time. On button won’t work. Er, yes electric is off and cue more tutting at ridiculousness of self.

Then a furtive glance to the vast pile of magazines nonchalantly gathering dust that I tell myself ‘need reading’ because really what better procrastination from writing and enquiring into your own brain when you can delve into paper awash with words, quietly housing serious brain power and research and interesting provocations between their modest pages.

I started leafing through the ‘Easter Specials’ knowing that my slackness on not having read these in time meant I had probably deprived myself and the family of sumptuous and inspired recipes - instead they got the usual mum roast on Easter Sunday without trimmings and definitely no deftly crafted cakes that required muscat wine or flaxseeds or delicate chocolates (I am not a proud non-baker).

But as I wove my way through the pile of magazines I also began another task because I needed to take note of all the wonderful things I was discovering on my reading journey. Filling up and completing my on phone/iCloud NOTES section. I don’t know about you but the notes section of my phone is quite a chaotic place to dwell. In between on the hoof shopping lists when I’m trying to not fall victim to the forgotten or lost shopping list - ‘courgettes, feta, fabric softener, decaf coffee’ I also stumble across vaguer queries of which I can’t recall the detail - ‘anything else for Friday, draught excluders?, mulch? Like a hazy memory, I do remember some months ago looking out at the deep snow drifts in a strange position on the draughty yoga studio floor that I must find some heat retention solutions. And also maybe trying to expedite warmer weather that I should also think about protecting and keeping some heat in the soil by adding mulch but that fairer weather task sloped off just as quickly as it came in and it stayed like a stray in NOTES.

Other casual virtual post it notes that I had started and not looked back on (is it just to house fleeting feelings or pearls of wisdom?), was a series of measurements that I have no idea what they related to but maybe a piece of furniture or rug I had my eye on. There was also a starting of a yogic blog about homogenisation of people and my Christmas list - that one I did refer back to and actually looking back at it from April’s perspective I got quite a lot of the things I asked for. Made all the more hard to decipher all of this as I couldn’t see that NOTES housed any dates but actually now looking back they do but I am sure that was not always the case.

This convolution whilst reading mags in the electric pause was because I was actually trying to find in the browsing was a list that I seemed to recall I had started called ‘Restaurants.’ You know those times when you have a pass out or now being a country girl, have joined up the intricate logistical jigsaw so well that that you can dip out into London or Cambridge to try the latest yummy or quirky place to eat/check out and have a bottle of wine without worrying about driving. Living practically off grid makes the mind and palette more curious! But alas I could not find the list I had started so I began a new one instead and starting scribbling down places to try that were popping up in influential people’s ‘Lunch With’ or the must visits featured in the Evening Standard’s ‘My London.’ In the 'soft features’ of the media outlets as we used to call them in the PR days - a snapshot of the person through the culture, food and arts they consume - usually quite insightful and more interesting than a profile piece also - and a platform that a journalist has less free reign to misinterpret or sensationalise.

During this rabbit hole dive that the magazines were facilitating, I stumbled across a few places that I said to self, I’ll quickly punch these into google, check them out in a nanosecond from their website and make a decision whether I will add them to said this new list. Er, electric STILL off, no wifi brains. Oh shit, yes, still can’t. Ok, keep reading, keep documenting unsolicited recommendations into notes that I started but may never look at again or maybe I will…

It brought back a real feeling of nostalgia. For a time when I was younger and wanted to find something out about something or somewhere. It was either a case of look it up in an outdated and cumbersome encyclopaedia or if you were lucky it might be featured in a newspaper or magazine or really old school, cultivate patience and just wait until you could visit the place or shop (Tammy Girl). There was something quite romantic about it all. Not knowing or seeing it in any format until your own eyes were right there doing the looking. No preemptive sneaks at the menu possible nor an opinion on the decor or if it was fashion being totally flabbergasted by all the lovely things just hanging there. In short, a warm anticipatory feeling of being excited about the trip to the shops or the place you wanted to lunch. Now I have less butterflies and anticipation about things because I feel that I have gone there already virtually and it feels odd when we don’t.

Except possibly for holiday or a new travel destination - this is so multi sensory and so new; one dimensional photos can never tell the story of how a place smells - the earth and the warm comforting aroma of home cooking there and the sensation of nourishing sun with a sea breeze on the skin. But of course the pictures can whet the appetite for the cultural rabbit hole you will invariably fall down into on arrival.

Turn on the light and stick the kettle on, electric is back on. But I am not looking at the menu of pictures of that Capri style eatery I will visit next week, promise…..