Life Writing Archives

On the green

November 12, 2023November 12, 2023 By ysellasims Life Writing / Roots & Redsand / Writing

Striding across the meadow looking as if he’s stepped out of Hardy’s fictional Wessex landscape, Steven McCulloch is wearing a wide-brimmed white hat, a billowing

Writing my way home

September 16, 2023September 16, 2023 By ysellasims Life Writing / Roots & Redsand / Writing

I bought a keyring a lifetime ago, from Roskilly Farm’s gift shop in Cornwall. It’s a round ball of smooth, turned walnut, fissured with black

A back step and a two step

August 30, 2023August 30, 2023 By ysellasims Life Writing / Writing

““I’m not a happy camper or festival goer”, I hear myself say over again in the run up to the festival. But as a kid I went to festivals and camped a lot, so maybe that’s not strictly true. Maybe I’d just forgotten how to do it.”

Flutterings

July 22, 2023July 24, 2023 By ysellasims Life Writing / Roots & Redsand

“…it can feel as though we have no control over the climate or our environment, that nothing we do matters; whereas in truth, everything does.”

Growing notes

May 31, 2023July 22, 2023 By ysellasims Life Writing / Writing

“Gardening, the act of putting my hands into the soil, saves me time and again.”

Watershed

April 14, 2023April 14, 2023 By ysellasims Life Writing / Roots & Redsand / Writing

“So my mind is full of what home means, whether it’s a place, a person, or a feeling, when the train pulls into the station and I climb aboard, looking for Dad.”

Hibernation

January 7, 2023September 16, 2023 By ysellasims Life Writing / Writing

“I feel more and more as though I belong to the before times – the 1970s and 80s, the watery technicolour of Crackerjack, disaster movies and flares, of kids under coats in seatbeltless cars, of drunk drivers and questionable personal politics.”

Autumn

October 5, 2022July 22, 2023 By ysellasims Life Writing / Uncategorized / Writing

I begin to find that the observations I have heard my mothers and mothers-in-law make over the years are now my own – I too have had enough of cooking and Christmases.

Birdlife

July 15, 2022July 17, 2022 By ysellasims Life Writing / Writing

“It was brutal, but wasn’t that what nature was, what we were, made brutal by our drive to survive?”

Poems to grow by

March 3, 2022March 8, 2022 By ysellasims Life Writing / poetry / Roots & Redsand / Writing

“We clamoured to be told the stories she had told us a thousand times before”

Tramp

February 10, 2022February 18, 2022 By ysellasims Life Writing / Roots & Redsand / Writing

“Once we’ve parted ways and I’ve set off around the fields, trying not to notice the stakes hammered in around the perimeters of both fields, I feel the jolt of reality. To walk here wouldn’t be possible for much longer – once the fence was up, it was up. It wouldn’t be coming down again. Each fence post suddenly feels like a line drawn in the sand.”

Running

February 4, 2022February 4, 2022 By ysellasims Life Writing / Roots & Redsand / Writing

‘As an adult I’ve always likened running to ironing – it’s just showing off. I’ve looked at runners and thought, but what are they actually running away from?’

There and back again

January 16, 2022February 18, 2022 By ysellasims Life Writing / Roots & Redsand / Writing

When we reach the station we discover the Station Tea Room. We push open the door, hovering, masked, in the doorway. “Can we come in?” we ask Dominic and Roger, working at a table. “Of course”, they reply, smiling.

Only Connect

November 11, 2021February 18, 2022 By ysellasims Life Writing / Roots & Redsand / Writing

“For small creatures such as we, the vastness is bearable only through love.”
As the light changes I begin to think about the big stuff and Carl Sagan’s wisdoms come to mind.

Rich pickings

October 24, 2021February 18, 2022 By ysellasims Life Writing / Roots & Redsand / Writing

‘One day Theo handed me a roll of electric fencing. “Hold this for a second, Nels,” he said. “You won’t connect it, will you?” I ask. “Nah, course not,” he says.’

Together apart

September 4, 2021February 18, 2022 By ysellasims Life Writing / Roots & Redsand / Writing

“Sorry,” the woman says to her invisible friend, murmuring hello to the dog as he lifts his head to her in greeting, “it’s just someone holding the gate for me.” Together apart. Together, together again. Sort of.

Making the jump

July 16, 2021February 18, 2022 By ysellasims Life Writing / Roots & Redsand / Writing

The swallows return and we host our first gathering in the garden, leading me to reflect on what makes it possible to make leaps of faith.

Cartwheeling

June 18, 2021February 18, 2022 By ysellasims Life Writing / Roots & Redsand / Writing

The natural world bounds and cartwheels back to life, bringing opportunities for much-missed connections.

The view from the hill

May 5, 2021February 18, 2022 By ysellasims Life Writing / Roots & Redsand / Writing

A reflection on our relationship with the natural world in light of a proposed development on a green field site in Sandford

Bita kaulo munthos

February 19, 2021February 18, 2022 By ysellasims Life Writing / Roots & Redsand / Writing

February turns from darkness to light as the days lengthen, life begins to push up out of the earth and we find reasons to have hope.

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