Unbought Delicacies: Dungeness

Tuesday, 24 May 2011

Dungeness

A friend mentioned Dungeness in a conversation last night, and it rekindled a long-held desire of mine to go there. I need to go there to see if the place is how I imagine it to be - how it looks, how it feels, what its place is like in the universe. I think my interest was piqued a while back when I came across Derek Jarman and Prospect Cottage, and saw the garden he and his friends had made there. It's one of the gardens I feel would be a privelege to visit, to stay a while in, to absorb and to remember. I don't why this should be the case over and above many other gardens I have visited/want to visit, but so be it.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/2008/feb/17/gardens

Imagine living there..................

I think it's a place for reflection and thinking, remembering and wondering, perhaps alone or with a close friend; for solitary being, for time out, for retrospection.
I know I will be there one day, and will come back and tell you if I was right after all.

4 comments:

Fran said...: Unfortunately you may be a little disappointed. The overwhelming view at Dungerness is that of the power station. I agree though, the little place on the beach with its garden does look like a slice of heaven x; 24 May 2011 at 14:03
Anonymous said...: It's a wonderful place, Sarah. We went last year and I took so many photos! The power station is a blot on a most beautiful landscape but Derek Jarman's cottage makes up for it. Just seeing my favourite John Donne poem in carved letters screwed to the side wall of the cottage did it for me but the garden is lovely too. There are lots of these ramshackle little cottages dotted all over the shingle along with a host of sweet little boats. You will love it. I can't wait to go back!

Kate from CL xx; 24 May 2011 at 16:02
Julia said...: The cottage in the first photo is so melancholy...

Solitude indeed, and how lovely.; 24 May 2011 at 19:05
Quilting Cat said...: I love Dungeness and have visited many times. There is a cottage there that you can rent but most are owner occupied. Without the power station looming over it would have become another tarted up holiday destination with posh beach huts etc. as it is, it's holds it's mystery, oddness and total lack of pretension. The beachcombing is divine, good food at The Pilot and some wonderful artists. The train ride from Hythe is worth taking also. Definitely a 'must visit'.; 25 May 2011 at 13:38

I have found such joy

I have found such joy in simple things;
A plain, clean room, a nut-brown loaf of bread,
A cup of milk, a kettle as it sings,
The shelter of a roof above my head,
And in a leaf-laced square along the floor,
Where yellow sunlight glimmers through the door.
I have found such joy in things that fill
My quiet days: a curtain's blowing grace,
A potted plant upon my window sill,
A rose, fresh-cut and placed within a vase;
A table cleared, a lamp beside a chair,
And books I long have loved beside me there.
Oh, I have found such joys I wish I might
Tell every woman who goes seeking far
For some elusive, feverish delight,
That very close to home the great joys are:
The elemental things- old as the race,
Yet never, through the ages, commonplace.

~ Grace Noll Crowell

Ideas for handmade gifts

Small knitteds - gloves, scarves, hot water bottle covers, hats, tea cosies, phone covers, little toys,,cushion covers, bags. Some of these can be felted/fulled for extra interest.
Edibles - chutneys and jams, pickles, nice teas in a vintage/retro tin, sweeties, toffees, mustard, home made wine and liqueurs, home dried fruits, ketchups.
For the home - trimmed tea towels, handknitted dishcloths, quilted wallhangings, small samplers, restored picture frames, pot pourri, lavender bags, covered coathangers, little scented bags for hanging on handles, framed photos of family,etc you've taken yourself, pincushion,needle book, scissor keeper, book of promises (eg babysitting, 1 hour's housework, the ironing, etc)
Bathtime - homemade soap, bath oils, bath salts, knitted washcloths, herbal bags for the bath, hand sewn toilet bags, trimmed hand towels, homemade lotions and potions packed in pretty jars and bottles.
For the garden - home saved seed in handmade decorated packets; homemade handcream, exfoliating soap, wheat bag for those digger's aches and pains!

Handmade books, personalised printed notepaper and envelopes.
Hamper of bits and bobs from the above lists, packed in a pretty lined basket.

I'll add some more as and when I think of them; These can be used all year round and easily tailored to the recipient - everyone loves a homemade gift. :)

Inspiring thoughts.............

I saw a man, an old Cilician, who occupied an acre or two of land that no one wanted.
A patch not worth the ploughing, unrewarding for flocks, unfit for vineyards;
he, however, by planting here and there among the scrub cabbages or white lilies and verbena and flimsy poppies, fancied himself a king in wealth, and coming home late in the evening, loaded his board with unbought delicacies.
Virgil

I had no theories to prove. I merely wanted to try living by my own hands, independently as far as possible from a system of division of labour in which the participant loses most of the pleasure of making and growing things for himself. I wanted to bring in my own fuel and smell its sweet smell as it burned in the hearth I had made. I wanted to grow my own food, or forage after it. In short I wanted to do as much as I could for myself, because I had already realised from partial experience the inexpressible joy of doing so.

Harlan Hubbard, Shantyboat: A River Way of Life

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Tuesday, 24 May 2011

Dungeness

4 comments: