Various positions

Today I am making a study of the science of sleep.

Sometimes it is difficult to tell which end is which.

And Rosie has been taking some sleeping lessons, tired out from searching for some sunshine.

Looking for summer

Once again we woke to a world wrapped in cloud so we walked to the top of the hill to look for summer.

The light was flattened, but patches of heather glowed purple and in the distance the sea met the sky with a soft line of gray, a smudge.

Summer was hiding. We looked through the brambles, but the sun wasn't there.

We looked in the gorse. Not here either.

Later the sun came briefly from behind clouds and the air was warm. Now it is night and the clouds have fallen from the sky. The old moon is a whisker and the world drips with water, not rain, just cloud fallen to earth.

One cat's week

This week I have been dreaming cat dreams to make into a necklace for Her for Her birthday and trying to find some sunshine. It seems as if the world is wrapped in damp cotton wool. It is cold and it whispers of autumn when it should be summer.

One puppy's week

This week I have been picking blackberries...

Exploring the hill with the big dogs and eating rabbit poo.....

sitting on the seaweed monster and being chased by the wave monster.

The land of badgers

Early twilight walking, we go to see if the badgers are about yet. Here the world is so overgrown with green that the badgers have made tunnels through the bracken. We sniff and rub against the bracken stems to leave a message for the striped bears when they wake. We have been here.

We look deep into the badgers home. New straw shows that cubs are here too. But all is silent. We can almost hear them dreaming of the night to come.

Pixie climbs the twilight fence post and looks across the sea where a distant lighthouse flashes a pulsing beat.

Sunlight through soft fur

Evening sunslant, running through a field of clover with Floss.

Life doesn't get any better than this, apart from when I am curled in Hannah's arms.

Just Purrfect no 2

Just Purrfect

Curiosity 2

At first we thought it was a chain of fire dragon eggs, but on closer inspection

we could see that it was

the dreams of ginger cats, caught in sunlight, made into beads.

Some dark dreams, some warm and happy dreams, all caught together in a beautiful necklace, all waiting to be dreamt again.

Sunshine and clouds

Between the heavy clouds the sky is blue. Between the rainstorms there is sunshine. Between the houses there is the little bit of heaven, fallen from a story book, that is Mr Griffith's house. If you listen you can hear birds' song and the walls whisper stories of heavy horses, old farm dogs, a childhood wild on the hills.
When there was no work to be done he would take a sandwich packed by his mother, with love, and out onto the hill he would run with friends from St Davids, to the beach at Porthmelgan, and down to the Gessel beach where now there is no path and not even a cat with fine paws and delicate balance could go. Here they would creep into the caves that were said to go far under the land, as far as the Bishop's Palace. And when they got so far under the cliffs where the light was only a pin prick behind them they would turn and run scared from the ghosts of smugglers and pirates, back to the light and the soft calls of buzzard, the falling song of the skylark and the turn of the waves.
He went away for a while when he was older, to Africa, to Europe, but then he came home. And he measured out his life in cats.
Now he is old and the friends of his youth have all died, or moved far away. The bones of the cats lie buried in the garden behind the house with stones that carry their names, Smokey, Daffyd ( a fine and fierce black tomcat as brave as any cat could be), Ewan the ginger. He can run over the hills only in his memory of summers long gone. So we visit and tell him how the old village fares, how the birds are singing, how the seals are back with pups again on the beach.

Meanwhile we hunt, and we hide in the golden wheat field that blends with our pale stripes. We search out the pheasants that hide in the long grass. And when we go home we tell Mr Griffiths what we have seen. We rub ourselves against his legs to let him know that we are there and he strokes our soft backs with his hands that see more than his eyes now can. Sometimes he thinks we are Ewan come back to him. He smiles.

Eclipse

All day the rain has fallen. Thick clouds shield the sun from sight, warmth from fur. We have curled tight in the house and hoped. Late afternoon the clouds rolled back, sunshine came and with it warmth and a rising of insects. Outside the air buzzed. A distant sea sound rolled and water drops dripped in a slow tune that remembered the rain symphony played earlier. Still we hoped and our hope was rewarded.
Tonight, clear sky, full moon, lunar eclipse, beautiful. And still the sound of the sea, pulled by the moon to rise and fall on the distant shore.

Cleaning

It was a cold day outside. All of the butterflies were taking shelter in dark places, waiting for the sun the shine. Weary bees struggled to collect damp, heavy pollen from disheveled flowers. The birds were silent, shocked. It seemed that someone had stolen the summer.

Inside the house Kiffer had decided to try an experiment. If he licked hard enough he thought maybe Rosie would be ginger underneath.

So he licked and licked until it began to tickle so much and Rosie began to wriggle.

Meanwhile in another part of the house Max was thinking it was time to exercise some mind control over the woman. The place was so full of clutter there was barely room for a cat to sleep.

Dragon eggs

Dragons? Where?

Ah! There!

Summer night in Pembrokeshire

Tonight the sky is half stars, half pale yellow swelling moon. Fingers of cloud catch at its cold flame. It is summer. A cold wind blows. The moon hangs over the sea, tangles in the branches of a wind-bent tree.

Work, work , work

She has asked me to say that She has a new book out this week. It is our book that we did together and I am the star of every page! Singing to the Sun by Vivian French was reviewed as the Sunday Times Children's book of the week by Nicollete Jones who said,

"Jackie Morris’s watercolours on cream paper show the influence of Italian Renaissance landscapes and medieval illumination. The faces are pale, haunting and sombre, the pictures have a unique and fantastical quality and her great strength is the well-observed depiction of animals — cats, dogs, donkeys and birds."

Glad we got a mention there.
She also asked me to mention that She has an exhibition in St Davids in The Pebbles Yard Gallery, upstairs in the cafe and you can see pictures of it here.
Does She think I have nothing better to do with my time? Does She not know that all night long I have been out in the garden watching the stars turn in a wheel of light across the night sky? Does She not realise that what I need now is sleep!

The house next door

Sometimes when it rains it looks as if Mr Griffith's house is crying as the water pulls colour out of the limewash on the walls. Centuries of stories whisper from the stones, the voices of children grown old by the fires in the chimney fawr, cats who have cozied by the flames in the winter.
Once there were chickens here, and horses. Once an old badger made a home in one of the barns, a lame fox came to be fed in the late evening light. Now the grass grows long in the yard, but Mr Griffiths still feeds the birds and small creatures who gather around whenever he comes outside.

Ambition

When I grow up I want to be just like Floss.

Clover

My name is Rosie and I am in clover.

The Little People of the air

In the green lane that leads to the top of the hill the light is emerald. Grass and fern trap the warm air and hold it tight, filling the lane with heat and the subtle scent.

All the way to the top of the hill a wren chattered angry song at the walking cats that trod her territory.

Insects made a background melody, butterfly wings, mayfly buzz and the steady drone of the bee, heavy laden with pollen. Grasshoppers added to the symphony of summer.

Hunting spiders spun soft webs to catch the plenty that filled the lane, the little people of the air.

At the top of the hill the air was cooler. We sat a while in the golden grass, then headed home.

Later in the twilight the lane to Llanferan was again filled with tiny white moths like the ashes of the moon.

Yesterday

Yesterday when we went to our blog we found a message from blogger saying "This blog has been locked due to possible Blogger Terms of Service violations. You may not publish new posts until your blog is reviewed and unlocked. This blog will be deleted within 20 days unless you request a review."�
"Oh dear", we thought.
Maybe someone objected to the picture of the dead stoat. Maybe it was the harmonious lives in the landscape that we lead that had caused offense. We can only guess as now we have been "reviewed" and we have been "unlocked" and we have not been deleted. So we are off to sleep in the sun and dream of adventures.

White wings, blue sky

Along the narrow green lane that leads to Llanferran, between high banks of bramble bushes that catch and claw, moths in the twilight, fill the air with their moon white wings, and brush against ginger fur,like a sigh, as they glance past and dance against the darkening sky.