Fake It until you Make It! Right? Another Ramble in the Middle of the Night.

 "More and more I found myself at a loss for words,

and didn’t want to hear other people talking either.

Their conversations seemed false and empty.

I preferred to look at the sea, which said nothing

and never made you feel alone."

                         Paula McLain – “The Paris Wife”

‘The Paris Wife’ is on my To Be Read list.  It’s a novel based on the life of Hemingway’s first wife, Hadley. She was the girl of whom he later wrote “I wish I had died before I loved anyone but her”. Hemingway has never really interested me and I don’t like his style of writing.  But from what I have reads of this book it sounds like a useful way of learning about the man through the experiences of his wife.  I only found out about the book thanks to coming across that quotation which is a way I often come across books and authors.  Paula McLain received an MFA in poetry from the University of Michigan and has been a resident of Yaddo and the MacDowell Colony. [For the non-American reader MFA is a Master in Fine Arts, a qualification which, so far as I know, we don’t have in the UK].  She is the author of two collections of poetry, as well as a memoir, ‘Like Family’, and a first novel, ‘A Ticket to Ride’. She lives in Cleveland with her family.

“Fake It until you Make It! Right?”

That is rapidly becoming my moral.  I felt lousy yesterday but tried to carry on as normal –a Florentine in the Woodlands, threatening to count the number of grains of sugar in a café sachet, doing crosswords, enjoying a delightful dinner (mushrooms stuffed with vegetarian haggis), watching the London 2012 Olympics on television….  In the supermarket I expressed concern about being able to shoot a haggis on a Bank Holiday (which it was in Scotland) but GB said it was alright because they didn’t count as ‘game’.  And so the day came to an end at 8.30p.m. having started at about 7.15 a.m. and with a lie down from 2.45 to 4.00 p.m..  “Why is Scriptor going through his day in even more boring fashion than usual?”, you may ask.  The answer lies in the fact that every inch of the day was fought for.  I was in unremitting pain – sometimes severe, sometimes ‘just’ pain. On top of that I had a background headache and twice a migraine threatened to come on. (Two more of my precious Sumatripan tablets consumed).  At home I would either have stayed in bed all day or moaned constantly at poor Partner-who-loves-tea.  Here, on holiday at GB’s I tried to adopt the “Fake It until you Make It! Right?” approach though I don’t know how successful that was.  Anyone any suggestions for a fourth approach ‘cos none of these are working right now?

Oh yes, and still it rains…

Ah well, that’s my moans out of the way, back to more cheerful matters for an aimless rambling post. 

Our day on Harris remains the best day yet from the point of view of photos and sunshine.

A few times on the road we passed masochists cyclists. 

We forget how foolish we ourselves were in our youth and marvel that anyone would want to spend their holiday being attacked by midges as they sweat their way up the hills of Harris with a month’s supply of equipment on the back of the bike. 

This is Luskentyre – an enormous beach on Harris.

The man with the Tilley hat is following me around (or vice versa). 

 19 across. Painting of clouds (7)  S_ _ _ C _ _ E

(Skyscape)

In need of a bit of TLC but someone cares enough to do this....

You get some idea of the scale of this Standing Stone when you see GB near it – it’s 2 metres tall.

 

Well, it’s 2.20 a.m. and I’ve only had five hours sleep so I’d better head back to bed…  I shall pretend I can smell the clover and hear the bees humming again...

 Have a good day!