Illustrat(h)er..

So it turns out it's quite hard to get a picture of my tattoo - they warned me that a circle on my wrist would stretch, in time, and though it hasn't warped into an oval yet it does tend to look that way when I stretch it around to take a photo of it.

It's a year since I got it and I thought it a good time to write some thinky thoughts about it. I know this might sound stupid to people who have countless tattoos, but to me this was a very profound experience - and though I often wake up in the morning having dreamt of the crazy extensions that I've had tattooed around it (not sure what this signifies), it's not an experience that I'm in a hurry to have again.

Don't get me wrong - I love my tattoo. I've never regretted it, and I don't think I ever will, precisely because it was the act of getting it done that means as much, if not more to me, than the mark itself.

Have you ever doodled something on the back of your hand to reming yourself - something that you need to pick up at the shops, or a doctors appointment maybe? My tattoo is a bit like that - which is one of the reasons why I wanted it somewhere as prominent and visible as my wrist. It's to remind me, to make me think, about lots of things.

The design itself is a "koru", a Maori symbol that I have a jade necklace of from New Zealand. It quickly became a sort of good-luck charm, and it made me feel safer and more confident to have it with me when I needed a bit of a boost. I like the cyclical, natural look to it. Some people have commented it looks like a shell, like a nautilus, or a ying and yang symbol, or...well, a foetus. Okay so the last one is a little weird (I can't imagine who'd want that on their wrist) but it's interesting that they all sort of represent the same thing. The design itself, and the Maori's koru symbol is based on an unfurling silver fern. It represents new life, new beginnings, but also, ultimately, that life goes the way it is supposed to go, and the way it has done for millions of years. According to wikipedia: "The circular shape of the koru helps to convey the idea of perpetual movement while the inner coil suggests a return to the point of origin."

At the risk of sounding a bit of a hippie - I like this idea, and it comforts me. I want to look at my wrist every day and remind myself that I'm on the right path, that everything it as it is supposed to be and the little things that cause me pain, and anxiety now, are ultimately transient. Every now and then I need to remind myself that I'm doing the right thing, that I've come a long way but there's a whole life ahead of me. Also, anyone who has come into contact with me at all will probably realise that I the world's biggest worrier - and I'm constantly battling with the niggling feeling that I don't deserve such wonderful friends, such a great job, such a nice life. Not in the sense that I'm not good enough to deserve good things, in a moral sense, but that I'm not grown-up or worthy enough, somehow. That I'm running with the big kids and one day they're going to notice that I shouldn't be here. So koru is to remind me that, in the words of Desiderata:

"You are a child of the universe

no less than the trees and the stars;
you have a right to be here.
And whether or not it is clear to you,
no doubt the universe is unfolding as it should."

As I mentioned before, the act of getting it done was important. I had just passed the three year anniversary of my moving to London, which in itself was a big deal for me. This time last year I thought I was happy, but I was lonely, a bit lost, trying to find myself again, I think. So the act of getting it done, the permanence of it and the pain, is to prove to myself that I am an adult - I am capable, I am strong - I can deal with these things. I can make big decisions and I can deal with the consequences.

Which brings me on to my last reason: if any of you know me well enough to have heard me go off on one of my "the trouble with kids these days!" rants, you'll know that I'm big on the responsibility of the individual - incidentally one of the reasons why the idea of organised religion has never sat well with me. Last year I was coming out of a place that had affected me deeply, and made me think deeply about my position in this world, the people around me and the way I want to go on with my life.

It basically boils down to this: shit happens. The world can be really fucking cruel sometimes. People can be horrible to you, or manipulative, or mean. Past relationships, friendships, childhood bullies, families. All of these people we come into contact with can leave marks on us, that affect us for a long time. But ultimately I believe you can't let this affect the way you treat other people. I wanted to remind myself that I am the only person responsible for myself, and I should be the only person who can leave a mark on myself.

So. A little bit deep and thinky, maybe. But I suppose if you're going to get a permanent picture drawn on you then it might as well be for a significant reason. So my tattoo is my lifelong "To Do" list: live well; remember I have a right to be here; be responsible; treat other people well - and you'll get where you're supposed to be.

Or, you know, something.

P.S. Lawks, this blog is getting far too serious! I'm going to have to counter this with something really stupid and frivolous. Go and check out "Condescending Lama" on http://animalsbeingdicks.com/ for something light and fluffy and really quite funny.

"P.S. How are the tomatoes?"

When I'm feeling sad, or sorry for myself, or lonely, I buy tomatoes for dinner - the small, expensive ones, still on their fuzzy sharp vines. The hot musky smell of them does something peculiar to my brain, opens a little wormhole in my head - or my heart, or somewhere- and sucks me through to my childhood. My own personal, internal, olfactory time machine. Time And Relative Dimensions In Smell. Or...something. I am a child again, standing in my Grandad's greenhouse, breathing in that smell. And it's a little bit theatrical, a little bit hammy (not the smell, the sentiment!), but I remember him like I last saw his yesterday, not five years ago.

But you see, my Grandad was often a little bit theatrical, a little bit hammy. A perfect, and my favourite example: The Curious Tale of The Missing Index Finger....

If I shut my eyes I can see my Grandad's hands - loose, wrinkled skin - the little nub of his left index finger which was cut off below the nail. When my older brother and I were kids he told us he'd got it stuck in the big anti-aircraft Bofors gun he fired during the war (presumably at a time when he and his mates weren't using the barrel of said gun to smuggle stolen tins of raisins, or being stranded on the wrong beaches with it whilst the rest of their regiment fought it out, a little way down the coastline, in the Invasion of Sicily.)

No, he told us that he'd been firing the gun in Egypt when his finger became trapped in the mechanism. Unfortunately it had to be amputated, but the story had a happy ending because he gave the nub of discarded finger, nail and all, to a sad and starving stray dog that had been skulking around camp - which led to the mutt following him around for the rest of the war. My mother, though, has another version: she was told as a child that he lost it in a duel with a Cossack. Yes. A duel. With a Cossack. Asking around, we realised that everyone had been told a different story.

That dashing looking blond lad up there is my Grandad, Ronald Price. I'm currently in the middle of spell-checking and correcting the grammar on the literally hundreds of letters that he sent to his parents whilst away during WWII, and which I've typed up and intend to make into some sort of book for my family. And I've finally found the truth of The Missing Index Finger:

"23^rd March 1945

I missed writing this weeks letter for a day or two as I squashed one of my fingers with a sledge hammer on Monday and the M.O had to cut the end of it off to trim it up. It’s the index finger of the left hand so it won’t bother me at all. It’s healing up very nicely so don’t get worried or anything."

They were putting up a tent. Not quite as glamorous as the duel or even the dramatic gun-mechanism-finger debacle. But this is my favourite story about my Grandad - if you know me well enough the chances are I've already told you it. It's my Grandad, right there. The entertainer. The comedian. The truth may not be as exciting as the overblown and entertaining tales that made us laugh as kids, but there's something in seeing this little paragraph, written to some parents at home in North London, worrying about their only son. Something so young and human. Reading these letters has let me see my Grandad as Gunner Price - in his early twenties, never left home till the war but now traveling the world, and desperate to document and share everything he sees and experiences with his mum, dad and sister back home.

In an odd way, I think I know how he felt. I spent three months in New Zealand at 19, phoning home almost every day to tell my family about the incredible places I'd been to, the people I'd met. I was desperately homesick but loving every minute - but more than that, more than homesickness, I was aching to share it all with the people I loved.

And here's my Grandad, old creaky Grandad young and blond, dancing and swimming and eating his way around Italy, spending his leave in Rome weighed down with guide books ("I saw the famous Colosseum but as it is not the first Roman amphitheatre I’ve seen I wasn’t very stirred"), going to a Turkish Bath in Iraq ("This brings to the surface all sorts of mud and slime whereon you blush hotly and wonder what mother would say"), picking up a tan in Sicily ("Yes sir, that’s me, the body beautiful. Oh what a treat the girls are missing.").

He was obviously making an effort to be cheerful and entertaining for his worried parents back home - and for his sister, who was slowly dying of a brain tumour. His letters to his parents and his sister in those last few months before she died are heartbreakingly chipper and positive, full of cheesy jokes and shared memories for her, and assurances for his parents' benefit that miracles happen every day, no matter what the doctors might say.

But it's the little things, the signoffs ("Cheerio love Ron"), the asides ("I hope Dad has just pruned the roses. Now is the time, you know) and the postcripts ("P.S. How are the tomatoes?") that bring it all home for me.

For a long time I've wanted to write something about my Grandad, but it's so hard to put into words all the things that I want to say. That I want to say to him, really. He passed away on the 29th of October, 2005. And I have missed him desperately, each and every day since.

I want to tell him how much we love him, of course - but other things, silly little insignificant things. I want to tell him that his letters are wonderful, that he was so very funny, and wrote so beautifully, and that I'm sure his words were a great comfort to his parents and sister. I want to tell him about my life now - the books I'm reading, the places I've travelled to and things I've done- the way I found the courage to get up and sing on stage because of him. The way I'll always try to be as good and loving and understanding and curious and excited a human being as he was - that I could never find a greater role model than him. And that I, like him, will never be too grown-up to get excited on Christmas Eve.

But I can't. But I do. In my head, every day. So here I am with my tomatoes, and I am a child again, and it's summer again - stretching on through endless sunny sunday nights, the knowledge of them ending there somewhere, but hazy, out of sight. I'm standing in my Grandad's greenhouse- stiflingly close air heavy with the earthy smell of things growing, sunshine and water on crumbly soil. The little concrete paving slabs line up between the tall green rows, a little tangle of strawberry plants makes a break for freedom through a gap in the breezeblock foundations. But mostly tomatoes. Little hot, sunny, red skin-cracked tomatoes.

"What did the Romans ever do for us, eh?!"

Cor, I spent ages on this picture! Again I'm left wondering when I will grow up and make proper worthy art instead of just drawing girls from different historical eras, but this was a great exercise in drawing straight on Photoshop which I very very rarely do. It's not really my preferred style, but it was good practice. Especially the hair, which took the bulk of 4-5 hours. This tiny crummy upload doesn't really do it justice, but there we go. Her name is Osian, which I know is a boy's name, but still.

I've no idea why but I'm currently in the midst of a massive Roman/Celt fixation. Alright, it's a bit of a lie when I say I don't know why - it all started when I went to see "The Eagle" movie a few weeks ago, based on the fantastic book "The Eagle of the Ninth" by Rosemary Sutcliff. The film is fun - nicely shot, good battle scenes, well acted - a little Hollywood-ish in places but forgiveable. It's not going to win any prizes for groundbreaking cinema, but it's a good fun movie - and it caught my imagination. And it's got that Billy Elliot bloke in it, skulking around being all slavey-y and Gaelic and moody and secretly/blatantly in love with his Roman master - Channing Tatum. Which is a made-up name if ever I heard one.

Every now and then I see a film or read a book which drags me into a particular obsession - usually a historical era. When this happens I just can't get enough of it: I need to read books and magazines about it, daydream about it, I need to watch films, listen to music, completely immerse myself in it. And then a few weeks later and normally with wallet a little lighter I come out the other end of the thing. Until next time, at least.

Mind you, I've always had a particular interest in ancient history and archaeology, so this is at least allowing me to indulge that. Everything seemed...more epic then, didn't it? When men built walls across entire countries, fierce painted tribesmen harried legionaries by appearing and disappearing in the mists, whole countries changed overnight. The list of things the Romans brought to Britain is staggering. I mean, locks and keys, glass, as well as little things like politics and governments and, you know, really really straight roads. They even had under-floor heating ("hypocausts" - amazing!). Turns out the Romans actually did do a lot for us.

The one thing that it's got me wondering though (and it's a pointless rhetorical question as I doubt anyone is reading this, but I can be self-indulgent on my own blog, right?): so much of our modern English language is from latin, and from the later Norman invasions, But when Rome officially got tired of mad tribesmen and year-long winters and abandoned Britain, the Celts and Saxons and British-born Romans were all left to jostle for power. The Celtic language was meant to be something like Gaelic but a lot more like modern-day Welsh (if that isn't a contradiction in itself) - so why aren't there more Welsh and Gaelic words in the English language? If that's what it evolved from?

Anyway, while I'm digging the whole Ancient Britain thing I feel I should really pimp out and recommend all the books by Rosemary Sutcliffe, and "The Eagle" soundtrack by Atli Örvasson, which has some truly epic celtic themed bits of music. I also watched "Centurion", which is alright but I enjoyed far less than "The Eagle" - because I couldn't give a toss about the characters and there was far too little bromance and much too much gratuitous day-go blood. Although it gets points for judicious use of Michael Fassbender. Oh and I revisited "Gladiator" and reminded myself why I loved it so much when I first saw it, and how magnificent the score by Hans Zimmer is. I'm currently debating whether I can sit through "King Arthur" and Keira Knightley's boney jutting chin again just to see the costumes and weaponry, or if it'll induce a repeat of the fit of hysterical giggles that it did the first time I saw it.

Hmm. Maybe my obsession won't stretch quite that far.

"Beautiful! Just beautiful!"

So on a spacey theme today, in honour of the 50th anniversary of the first man in space, Yuri Gagarin, I want to share this song - "Space Walk" by Lemon Jelly. The voice sample used is Alan Bean (so the internet tells me) an American astronaut, describing the sunset as seen on a spacewalk outside their craft. The song itself is wonderfully bouncy, uplifting and summery, but Bean's commentary is gorgeous - it's incredible to think that this is the voice of a man speaking as he sees the earth, the first "point of light" of the sunrise from space. The joy in his comment of "I feel like a million dollars" is evident. He's witnessed a sight that the majority of us will never know - a sight that would without a doubt change a person's life, and their perspective on the world they live in, forever.

Still, it'd scare the shit out of me. But then that's why I'm not an astronaut.

Enjoy!

Aiding and abetting: '50s shoot with Scarab Pictures

So my wonderful and talented friend Claire of Scarab Pictures asked me to run around in the Soho sunshine, dressed in '50s-ish rockabilly clothes - how could I resist? I'm very lucky to have such talented and creatively brilliant friends, who often not only abide my penchant for dressing up, but often actively encourage it!

Check out the whole shoot here.

Newspaper milestones, straws to clutch at, and finding hope and shouting fucking loudly about it.

Today I bought The Times - I rarely buy newspapers, in fact, I only really do when there's something really significant on the front page. I take them home, well-thumbed and read on the tube, the ink slightly worn off on my fingers, and pack them away safely in a box.

I can pinpoint this habit back to a specific date - 12th of September 2001. I remember the front page clearly: vivid, almost obscenely blue sky; two stark white lines; a smudge of black smoke; balls of bright fire. Moments before the World Trade Center towers collapsed. I was almost 17, had just moved school, was blissfully unaware of my naivety. But this - this was too big a thing. The other day I sat around with some friends, nearly ten years on, and the conversation somehow turned to that day. It's almost a cliche, but everyone remembers where they were and what they were doing on that day. It's a milestone now, a Before and After. No one, no matter how young, could fail to see how utterly and completely world-changing that day was.

So I bought a newspaper. And it wasn't just the covers I wanted to keep, the terrifying headlines or the shocking images - I wanted the whole papers. I wanted to look back in years to come and see all the many mundane trivialities we concerned ourselves with on the days that rocked the world off its axis, for just a moment. The way that we were still talking about the latest film reviews or the celebrity gossip when the little path we're blazing as a species is shunted sideways, in the blink of an eye, changing everything.

So there they sit, these paper records: dictators and towers and cities toppled, men rescued from deep under ground, new leaders elected, economies slumped, earth shifting and ash-clouds. A little while ago I was clearing out my old room at home and came across those papers, now all packed and sealed in a box that I left my parents with strict instructions to stash in the attic.

Folded and piled neatly next to old birthday cards, my exam results, diaries, letters from friends - little transient things that never seem to lose their significance over time. There's something fascinating in the complete paradox: the fragility of the paper and ink, and the permanence of the stories they tell.

So today's Times will go into the box, and some day I know I'll look back on it and realise how the events that began last friday off the coast of Japan sent aftershocks rippling into the years to come. My only real wish is that, over the years, I will be able to add to this odd collection with happier headlines.

I feel on the brink of being drowned by this tsunami of terrible images, body-counts and lives utterly devastated - I hope that somehow we can rise as a species, rise all over the world and pull ourselves out of this swamping desolation. I know there's so much we can do, so much we can achieve - incredible things. But they're never as loud or as insistent as the tragedies, and this needs to change. We need to get over our rubber-necking morbid fascination and shout - really fucking loud - about all the wonderful things people do for each other and for the world we live in every day.

And with that, I'll finish with a link that I've found and has made me smile, just a little. Small miracles amid the carnage, from the Brisbane Times. Read to bolster your ever dwindling hope reserves. If anyone is reading this and finds similarly hopeful links please do feel free to post and share here - clutch at enough straws and we might just make it through.

EDIT: Since posting this I keep seeing little bits of...well, maybe not "good news" as such, but tiny little human things that I suspect are happening all over Japan right now - kind acts, a smile here or there, politeness and respect and civility in the face of utter ruin. Everywhere we see the depths that humans can sink when they are afraid, in pain - to but I want to hear the stories of the good things - which (believe it or not) are human nature too. So I'm going to compile them here:

BBC news - an old man sifts through the wreckage of a ruined Japanese city, searching for stranger's keepsakes - he finds a photo of a smiling man holding a baby under a blue sky, blossom on the trees in the background, another of a line of children in uniform, a school trip - he puts them in a plastic bag. "The army will burn all of this. If these children are gone now this will be precious to someone."

BBC news - Katie Hinman of ABC News tweets: "Driving through the wreckage of Sendai, and saw the saddest sight: a bewildered horse standing alone among it all."

Then later:

The tweet by Katie Hinman of ABC News about the lonely horse in Sendai (See 2146) prompted Breda Gahan in Dublin to email in: "Can't believe I read this. Please return horse to Natsuko Komura." The BBC's Damian Grammaticas interviewed Ms Komura on Sunday as she searched for her trusty steed near Sendai's beach. She had been riding it when the tsunami approached on Friday, but had not seen it since.

BBC news - A Twitter campaign has been set up to persuade Japan's Chief Cabinet Secretary, Yukio Edano, to go to bed.Mr Edano has been dutifully covering the nuclear crisis at all hours of the day and night, but many TV viewers feel the strain is beginning to tell. The hashtag #edano_nero - "Edano, go to bed" - has been trending on Twitter.

Christchurch, New Zealand

I can't believe it was almost 7 years ago that we sat enjoying the autumn sunshine in Cathedral Square, Christchurch - sitting on a bench outside the beautiful cathedral, watching buskers and street performers, moving every now and then as the sun sunk lower and the huge shadow cast by the spire crept towards us.

We were staying in a hostel opposite the cathedral, and spent the days roaming the city - taking the tram to the art gallery and wandering around its lovely little bead shop. We walked miles to find a little vintage shop where Cara bought a lovely deep green velvet blazer and Bridget a fantastic '70s green and white polka dot dress. We walked for about 40 minutes one evening out of town to a cinema to watch "Harry Potter & the Prisoner of Azkaban". I bought the book - I picked it up again the other day. It made me smile to see the inscription I'd written on the title page: "Bought in Christchurch, New Zealand - the perfect place to Potter. 15th June, 2004"

And it was the perfect city to potter, with its old Hogwarts/Oxford/Cambridge buildings - pretty much the only old stone architecture in NZ. It had a wonderful, friendly atmosphere - probably due to our meeting up with Hannah (old friends of the family, she'd moved there when she was younger. I hadn't seen her in years but it was like nothing had changed) and the warm friendly attitude of the locals...but maybe also due to its familiar English feel and that fact that, after nearly 3 months traveling around the country, we were nearing the end of our trip. As much as I loved the place, I was looking forward to seeing home, familiarity again.

A few days later we took a small internal flight from Christchurch to Auckland, and from there a flight back to the UK. I swore I saw Orlando Bloom in the airport. I jiggled my legs the whole journey - a nervous flyer, a nervous everything - but as the plane rose above the clouds the view was breathtaking: a blanket of cloud with the snow-capped Southern Alps a line snaking away into the north.

All I can seem to think about now is that evening, sitting outside the cathedral. I have a photo somewhere of us sitting on the bench, Bridget perched on the top wearing her polka dot dress. That bench is under rubble now - the spire of the cathedral collapsed during the quake. I remember the little old ladies that worked in the cathedral visitor centre and I hope they got out before the whole thing came down.

Such a terrible terrible thing - and strangely, almost shamefully, I feel more shaken and upset by it than any tragedy before, because I feel like I know that city.

If you can spare anything, please please donate to the Red Cross NZ earthquake appeal.