June Update

The weather is outrageously hot here today. So rather than hanging out in the garden with the dogs, I’m hiding inside in the (relative) cool, making it the perfect time for the first update since I redid my website!

From the bookshelf

I was in a reading slump for most of the spring. Every book felt like the same old meh. So I turned to a reliable favourite, and listened all the way through Terry Pratchett’s City Watch series. The audiobook editions I listened to were narrated by Jon Culshaw, and it was such a great experience. Really well done. And of course, Pratchett’s writing was as funny and angry and comforting as usual, and made me feel a bit better about dealing with our broken world. He doesn’t flinch away from all the ways people can be selfish and power hungry and exploitative, but he also doesn’t stop telling us that we are better than than. We can DO better than that.

That’s what I find so comforting about the City Watch books: Sam Vimes knows exactly what beastly behaviour he is capable of, and what power structures will allow his beastliness to cause worse harm, and he says “Absolutely not.” He will be a better person, he will make a better world, even if he has to use stubborn determination, battle bread and his own two hands to do it.

We can all fight for Truth, Justice, Freedom, Reasonably Priced Loved and a Hard Boiled Egg. As ever, GNU Terry Pratchett

From the garden

After a spring with the least helpful weather possible (baking heat when we needed rain; miserable rain when we needed sunshine) thing are finally moving in the garden. My sweet peas are finally starting to put on some height and all the bedding plants are in the ground.

My ongoing efforts to fill the garden with native flowers continue to pay off, both in the volume of insects and birds crowding the place, and the gorgeous sight of all thesepurple mallows. I fell in love with them last year, when they turned up in a wildflower seed mix I threw at a scrappy bit of mud, and now I cannot get enough.

This year’s new addition to the favourites is the ox-eye daisy. I planted them last year, but they’re perennials that need some time before they’re ready to flower. And boy do they put on a joyful display. They never fail to bring a smile to my face. I suspect they’re going to be a long-standing feature in this garden – the soil is such poor quality (a thin layer of heavy clay over pure chalk) that many of my gardening experiments fail, but the ox-eye daisies do not care a single bit about the inhospitable circumstances.

From the yoga mat

With most of my energy going to the garden and the puppy at the moment, the time I have for asana (the physical practice of yoga) is limited. Instead I’ve been focusing on the mindfulness and meditation practicesthat I let slip while I was so busy with the puppy’s first few months. My favourite addition has been starting the day listening to THIS beautiful version of the Gayatri mantra, which meditates on the illuminating and awakening properties of the Sun.

Thanks for reading!