Moments of 2014

Another year has flown past without me realising and this makes me scared because I'm 23 now and time is going faster and faster and I suddenly feel as though I'm stuck on a carousel with no way to jump off. It was only when I started browsing through snaps from 2014 that I realised how it felt like five minutes ago that I spent an endless summer of wild camping with my friends, watching shooting stars and singing bonfire songs and that was 2013. Some memories are so distorted time-wise in my head, that if I haven't taken any photographs of them I can't even remember if they were last year or the year before or a fortnight ago. 

This really scares me, and it's made me realise the importance of taking photographs and writing a little something every day to remind us because each small day is as exceedingly important as the big days. 

This year, I think I'm going to run a journal of photographs and focus on making every moment count. I don't want to do it for blogging, I don't live to blog, blogging should just be nothing more than a scrapbook of little adventures, a mood board for things I love and a way to promote an adventurous life spent outdoors. That isn't to say blogging isn't important to me, because it is. I just want to make it grow without it interfering with enjoying each day as it comes.  

I'm not planning on really making any resolutions because I'm finding it hard at the moment to distinguish one year from the next and therefore perceive it as a fresh start. The only way I can perceive it, is a new folder in my documents because I categorise all of my photographs into separate folders under months of the year. 

Time is a flurry of snow, and it bamboozles me. I'm going to endeavour to understand time and immerse myself in creation, natural beauty and all things arts. I'm learning to stop spacing out and clear the cobwebs that fill my dusty hibernating mind. I need to stop being a drifting cloud and find my feet. This year, is about waking up. 

Here are some 'little moments' of 2014. 

'The day the floods came. The rain covered everything and I was delighted to find that I was surrounded by what felt like a still ocean. As I sat on the train back to Cornwall, I stared at fields that were once farms that were now endless mirrors of water. The pretend ocean almost covered the tracks and for a moment I could believe I was being Spirited Away. After a while, we stopped and for half an hour I could just stare through the train window and marvel at the beauty. There was a sadness in that beauty, because countless folks had lost their homes, their lands and their possessions to that beauty and for many, my dream was a nightmare. I felt guilty for enjoying those moments of peace because it had cost someone else so much. After that half hour was up, the train turned around and went back to Bath because the track had been lost. I had to take many buses to find my way home, but I did it, and when I did, the storms greeted me.'

Tea parties to celebrate my friends birthday, and walks in the countryside because we were pining for home. I'm lucky in some ways, that two of my best friends have moved as well and we all live near each other (so close in Jesses case that I can holler down the stairs at her) We all struggle with being parted from the sea, but we struggle together. 

'This day, we visited the beach and there was detritus and gifts from the sea as far as the eye could sea. Beautiful trinkets, driftwood, shells, rubble from boats and salt-faded nets. I gathered as many mussels as my pockets could carry for I love mussels as they remind me of the nights sky. I try to paint them and create tiny milky ways but I could never paint the way nature does.'

Trelissick Gardens, towards the Roseland where we had a beautiful picnic, drank wine and watched an outdoor performance of 'The Tempest'. I want this tower to be my home.

Down our way, there are wonderful vardos. How I would love to live in a vardo, or have one to renovate and take it somewhere secret and pretend I lived that way. Actually, my friend really did live in this very vardo once upon a time, but it had seen better days back then!

And then there was my fascination with chimney pots, and my many attempts to climb out of attic windows to reach them.

Days spent by the sea with my favourite people

The canal ways of Bathampton are among my favourite haunts when I'm in the city. Another of my dreams is to live on a barge. George, who considers himself somewhat more refined and in need of creature comforts doesn't quite agree of their appeal, but maybe one day I'll rent a boat for a while and write and write and write.

'Spring found us eventually, and we were glad of it. We were able to take off our coats and scarves and feel the warm air on our bare feet once again.'

In the summer, Jegan and I went wild swimming at a wonderful swimming hole called 'Warleigh Weir'. It took clambering through several fields, over a train track and canal way to find, but it was worth it. It was one of the most perfect days of the summer and for a moment, I forgot to miss the sea. 

Many evenings of our last 3 years together have we spent on the wonderful Helford. The Shipwrights is one of our frequent haunts, and Niki's band often play there. Sadly, they have begun to price themselves out of reach for locals, but every so often they'll have 'JellyJazz nights' and BBQ's and the place will come alive as the surrounding villages get together for a party on the river.

 Climbing waterfalls in the Glen near Tintagel. Another one of my favourite memories from the summer

This wonderful invention 

 A trip to Weymouth, a seaside experience totally different from our usual.

On one of the first nights I came home for the summer holidays officially, George and I went to Chynalls in Coverack and sat on the headland. We read fairytales aloud and played with the ponies that graze there. The sunset was perfect and I wanted to build a little hobbit hole there and stay there always.  

 Some days it rained, but that didn't matter.

And some days we built bonfires and played music by the river.

And then there was the fairy ball. 

And not to mention a surprise trip to Paris! our main mode of transport were bicycles which is by far the best way to sample that wonderful city.

Wildflowers by the sea

Being barefoot 

Local events, like the annual church fete! 

Roaming in the wilderness with Louis and the Sanger clan 

Trips to St.Ives for lazy afternoons 

Watching plays at the incredible Minnack Theatre 

Our last evening by the sea, before George moved with me back to Bath to start his teacher training! 

Thunderstorms on the night we arrived. How is it somehow that I always seem to unintentionally chase storms?

Autumn happened, and the leaves began to fall

And soon the pubs were serving my favourite winter drinks again!

Outdoor fires became more necessary

And once again we found our way home. 

 2014 has had it's wonderful moments, and it's difficult ones. The biggest and best moment was changing degree from Photography to Creative Writing. Although I love taking photographs and they are exceedingly important to me, so are a hundred other things. I came to University to learn, and I have learned so much from just six months of studying CW! Luckily they let me skip the first year so in the end I will have completed four whole years of university. With a little luck, I'm either going to do an MA in Edinburgh and travel around the Highlands and Islands or look for creative work. Although I'm dying to come home to Cornwall and live permanently again, I know that my hobbits journey isn't over yet. I want to explore my fascination with islands and mountains and it's for that reason that Scotland beckons me. I want to fully embrace this rainy isle that is my home, and love every bit of it.

H a p p y     2 0 1 5 

To the next adventure