landing with a thud

'Pain, in the sense of physical pain, is a typical sensory experience that may be described as the unpleasant awareness of a noxious stimulus or bodily harm. Individuals experience pain by various daily hurts and aches, and occasionally through more serious injuries or illnesses.'
quote from Wikipedia

These are My Headlines for Today:

the festival is finished

i was bowled over by Tracey Emin exhibition

i was exhausted by our amazing gallery exhibition

my tv arial transmitted water into the tv instead of a tv signal, i am now without a tv

and have been housebound with too much pain but am getting better

i missed Dorian Grey and La Clique

but all will be well

i wonder what it would be like to live in a city that didnt have the Edinburgh Festivals going on all through August. it just seems to be such an anual hiatus.. you get overwhelmed with the sheer everything of it so things seem to be a blur. but you only start to realise this when it has stopped and everyone's gone away, and September's slightly fresher air with the scent of the sea wafts in, just that hint of cooler times to come through the sunshine, and the rain washed trees of all the city parks add to the scents on the air. it is the same each year. you can breath again.

so anyway, i seemed to over-do it all a bit and got very emotionally and physically drained, my arthritis got very bad so i had no proper sleep for quite a few nights, which ended up with me hobbling to the gallery on my stick and eventually coming home and staying here. i missed the two events i had planned to see; La Clique at the Spiegeltent, and Mathew Bourne's Picture of Dorian Grey - luckily i found friends who wanted my tickets. and then it was fireworks last night. (was it last night?!) which were apparently brilliant, but all i got were the huge loud bangs - living just down the hill from the castle where they were being set off. usually i just slip down the back close to the street and catch what i can in amongst the street crowds.

i was in too much pain to care about missing everything. i was angry, as usual when i get this bad, that i have to be this person. its so frustrating, so annoying and so demeaning somehow, like i become a half person, a shadow, not really there.
what is particularly difficult is the fact that my right leg goes ape at the same time as my left shoulder-blade and neck. so that finding a way to lie down in bed to sleep with the least pain to my leg and my shoulder is actually impossible! so i get up and hobble round the flat, make a cup of tea, sit about and wonder if i will ever get any sleep again in my life. try to meditate, try to breathe into the pain, sometimes that works; other times i want to shout and yell. thats the thing - it always seems as if this will go on for ever, you cant imagine a time without the pain. and yet, when it all calms down, and you can walk properly and sleep properly again, you forget it and carry on as if you are a girl of 18 again. i have to learn i am no longer 18, 25, 39 or even 51 - my body just isnt as strong and flexible. damn. damn and blast.

eventually, i seemed to find a way to calm down. my homeopath had given me some remedies and i think that helped. but it wasnt until i had been stranded at home for a couple of days that i finally managed to rest on the sofa with a blanket and just close my eyes and feel myself letting go and drifting, and i suddenly realised that i was relaxing in a way that i had not done for a long long time. tonight i peeled a kiwi fruit and carried it through on one of my favourite white and blue plates, and as i did so i noticed how lovely that delicate green, almost a lime green but gentler, on the china white and blue looked, and i thought - goodness, i have slowed down; this is ok.

for now. i have to gear up and get going again soon, but not yet.

the exhibition at the gallery was huge; in size and scope and in audience and press response. the installation took 5 days and a lot of helpers, and de-install took 3 very very long days out of necessity as the next show had to get in and up. it was a lot of work.

but i did have time to go and see Tracey Emin at the national gallery of modern art - and i was bowled over. i had meant to blog about it that night. i also managed to get to a talk by an art historian on Tracey Emin's work - with questions and answers with Trace afterwards which was also very rewarding.

i will blog about that more later i think. its been quite important for me.

images of graves in Greyfriars Kirkyard copyright trude blows

(how do you make that copyright c inside the circle thing, anyone know?)