The Wonder of it All

Dearest Emily,
Well, just a couple more pictures to do, and it will be time to put them together as an exhibition. I thought, if you didn't mind, that I would print out my blog-posts to you to go next to each painting. It'll give people something to read as they walk down the corridor with the pictures up.
This picture is of a favourite view of mine- of Freshwater Bay and the High Down- as seen from the cliff near Compton. This is where Grumpa parked up the car one day, back in 2006, at sunset. We stood looking out as he cranked up the Red Hot Chilli Peppers playing in the car - in particular, the track 'Wet Sands'. Apparently, he was plucking up the courage to ask me to marry him.
I guessed that, as we stood there together- but he didn't ask me then. But- he did a week later, so that's ok. This picture was at six in the evening, last Sunday.

This favourite view of mine, I know I share with many, and it has been so for hundreds of years.
Tennyson, arriving here, house-hunting with his new bride- saw Farringford Hall, and looking out of the window there at the reverse of this view (towards Blackgang Chine) declared that they had  to have that view.
Nearly 100 years earlier, a Mr Richard Worseley wrote in his book about the Isle of Wight, that this vista was a 'Wonder of the World'.
I'm with both these bods, Em, and from the first time I set foot on the beach here with my Dad in 1967, to the time Peter and I alighted here in 2005, I too- have had to have that view, and I do consider this landscape a 'Wonder of the World.'
Tennyson's Monument crowns the High Down today, and Grumpa's ashes were spread as he wished out to sea beyond the Bay.
He said to me, that whenever I wanted to see him, I should go to the Bay-
"I shall be in the waves,
Sometimes choppy,
Sometimes calm,
But, I'll always be there for you."
A but like in life, really Em.
And that works for me, I come here, I look out to sea, the sun maybe setting, or rising, the water rough, or smooth, and rolling gently into the shore.
Food for the soul Emily dearest, and a true Wonder, at that.

Your ever-loving Grandmother,
GiGi XXX

Idylls of Freshwater

Dearest Emily,


What a beautiful morning! It's about thirty degrees here, and I have just opened up the shop- hoping to get a quick post out for you with some new paintings. Here's one of the Estuary that I did for you last week.

You remember the Causeway 'Em, the old railway line that links Freshwater and Yarmouth? Every year Swan's hatch their brood for the year. This year it seems that only two have survived out of a brood of about five. I've painted scenes up and down the Causeway- and I must admit- its brilliance of colour can be challenging. It's a problem just recording the translucent iridescent scenery in front of you. It can look too idyllic.

Similar problems present themselves to me at Freshwater Bay

I suppose that I could be seeing these colours more vividly than they actually are 'Em, but I don't think so.


My third Idyll in Freshwater is my garden. It's a good year for the roses.

This morning before work I went into Boots the Chemist for some toothpaste. Whilst standing in the queue, a lady in front of me greeted her friend who was standing to the side awaiting a prescription.

"Oh sorry," said the friend- I was miles away. "Goodness me, that's where I'd like to be, miles away from here under an Oak Tree perhaps, by a babbling brook".
There followed further discourse about the stifling heat.
As I left and thirty seconds later walked across School Green, alongside the Brook, which bears the name Brookside, and ambled in and out of dappled sunlight, passing people sitting under trees and I wondered how far she felt she needed to go to get away?
A customer has just furnished me with an apt quote for today, dear Em. It is from E.Nesbit's The Railway Children...
"Many wonderful and good things happen in our lives, and we live most of our lives in the hope of them".
Just looking around me Emily for subjects to paint- I rather think that there could be less time hoping for them and more time enjoying them, if we reminded ourselves more often of what we do have.

What do you think Emily?

Your  ever-loving Grandmother, GiGi xxx