Wilful No-ness - The Adventurer

hi there

How has your day been?

We have recently had our Wedding Anniversary - on Halloween.  Many people pull a funny face when I mention that we got married on Halloween.

I can understand why given the masks and scary costumes, associations with the Souls of the dead. There is nothing like a huge bonfire to scare off evil spirits...so they say....

Halloween for me as a child was such a wonderful, fun evening and my sister and I couldn't wait to get changed into some kind of costume and venture out with our corny jokes.

My favourite house to visit was Mr and Mrs Hussain's a few doors along from us. They were such lovely, warm people and Mrs Hussain made the most amazing toffee apples! Worth waiting a whole year for.

Our wedding anniversary would have actually been in September had all things gone to plan but I became very unwell with Obstructive Jaundice a few days before and was admitted to hospital.

I was most upset about my flowers! I guess that is possibly a strange thing to be most upset about. I had Nicole Roses coming from South Africa, Cassablanca Lillies, Singapore Orchids, berries, and, and, and.... :-(

This was to be my very last wedding I would provide wedding flowers for back then and it felt very exciting and rewarding to be making my own. I had never been on the receiving end of my attentive, creative Self before and in a funny way I felt really pampered.

Luckily being in the wedding industry here in Gretna Green the hotel where we had planned to marry knew me very well and generously swapped dates for us. Sheila, who was performing our Ceremony was flexible too and everything shaped up really well for the new big day.

We were married in the evening, arriving in the dark and had candles and beautiful music. My Mum had made a deep red velvet wedding gown.

When we arrived at the venue for the 'evening do' as an extra touch they had made pumpkin soup for everyone to warm them up and had made Lanterns from pumpkins, lit up with candles inside. They said if we didn't like them they would remove them immediately, but we were enchanted.

I was still rather pumpkin coloured myself following my obstructive jaundice but I'm sure I blended in well with everything :-) awww such lovely memories

Do you have happy memories of Halloween? Did you spend hours carving out a pumpkin to make a lantern?

I have made an effort each year to provide Halloween fun at our front door for all the local children over the years. This year is the first time we haven't 'done' Halloween in about 30 years.

Our youngest is now a grown up, muscly, almost-6-footer and went out to see the film; Halloween 2018 and so we spent the whole of the day on ourselves. I must say I did feel rather mean closing the curtains and keeping the lights off so children wouldn't come shouting at our door but it was special keeping the evening just for us.

Oh, I meant to thank you for all your lovely emails enthusing about my latest ecourse 'In The Words of A Song'.  Wow, I knew it was an amazing experience for me to create the course, as I put myself through the whole process before releasing it out into the World, but I am just so delighted that you have enjoyed and embraced it so much too. So thank you!

I thought I would share my Soulful Face painting just created.  I love her. I created her on paper, a mixed media which I began by tearing up prints of my art and 'gelling' them.  I used a variety of metallic water colours, oil pastels & paint sticks, gel medium, acrylic paint, glitter.

She put up quite a struggle as she was emerging. I noticed her mini 'forest' up on her forehead. I just couldn't 'hide' this under paint, it just had to be revealed and so I accepted it. It 'spoke' to me of a tangle in her mind. A struggle between 'yes' and 'no'. It didn't make sense initially but I trusted it and continued.

She seemed quite young, around 10 years old. The only thing I seemed to love about her was her nose and eyebrows. When her Eyes appeared I found them really challenging. I wanted to soften them but they just refused. Everything I seemed to 'want' for her she did not want. What was it about this young girl!

She had a tiny mouth that seemed 'pursed' somehow. I found it interesting that I had so many 'wants' for her and she did not want any of them.

We certainly tussled for a while, she and I. In fact I am sad to admit that I pushed her aside for a couple of days. I felt like I didn't like her, I didn't want her, she was hard work!

When I went back to her, I felt less irritated but it didn't take long until I began to feel that same 'wanting something different' for her. I seemed to forget all of my tools that I offer others when they are creating. I felt 'bossy' and 'in charge' and was 'determined' she would be pretty and feminine.

Finally however, when I went back to her after another two days of ignoring her, I managed to put aside all that I wanted for her and that helped me to see her for the first time.

She looked feisty and wilful. Determined. She had a lot of 'no' in her. Strong. Bright. Energetic.

Her eyes actually looked sad when I gave her a voice and she explained how everyone always wanted their best for her but nobody had ever asked her what She wanted.

All they ever heard from her was 'No!' including me, but given our determination to change her, well.... no wonder.

So possibly for the first time ever, I gave her a voice and asked her, 'What do You want?'
Her answer? 'To travel North.'

It's pretty chilly up North, especially where she wants to go to see the Northern Lights so I made her a cosy snood in blues, teals, pinks and with gold sparkles.

As soon as I managed to accept her as she was, I felt so differently towards her. Full of love and hope that she can fulfill her dreams. I had no idea she was such an Adventurer but at last she has been seen and heard <3

I need a name for her. Any thoughts? If so, please email This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.

Take care of yourself,
warmly

Kassi