JANUARY 2020 AWARENESS OF THE WORD JOY AND THE COLOUR YELLOW

THE FRIDAY BLOG PAGE

JANUARY 2020

AWARENESS OF THE WORD JOY AND THE COLOUR YELLOW

As we come to the end of January, I started thinking about the last few weeks and how dedicating a word and a colour to my days had opened my eyes. The word “Joy” the colour “Yellow” have been thought about every day this month. Has it helped? Did it make any difference at all? Well yes it did. Mostly in small ways that gave my day an extra lift. Here are some of the joyous moments. The bright yellow evening primrose that flowers in the evenings so one can easily miss them. To start the year we had some rather dull cloudy days, but brightness was waiting for us one morning as we walked along the walkway. Turning a bend in the pathway between the fence and the railway line on a somewhat neglected piece of land were the lovely Evening Primrose flowers lifting their faces towards the sky, shining their insight, and transforming the rough place into something rather magical and adding a big smile to our walk.

Having to stop for a rest in the afternoon is something I find hard to do every day. But my back issue is always helped if I do. When one adds a touch of joy with a drop or two of the colour yellow it becomes a new way of looking at having to rest. Resting now will help me enjoy the rest of the day, it is an opportunity to restore my energy and refresh my soul. Having morning tea with jasper on one side and a good book in my hands, a detective mystery of course, oh the joy of taking as long as I like, reading as many pages as I want to. Not too many years ago, more than ten minutes or at a push fifteen, I would most certainly have frowned upon that, so many other things to get done. But when you have put joy into your day, one can think and know that there is just me to please and it pleases me a great deal to be able, with reason, to do as I wish. Yellow is about so may things like finding smiles in odd places, laughter, and that great feeling of being at peace with life. Yellow helps to strengthen the mind helping us to think clearly, bringing a new balance to the day and giving us a real sense of confidence to enjoy the day. Among other smiles that have come my way this month are Rory Clements’ jolly good spy mysteries. These lines added a smile to the page in his book “Corpus”. The character Lydia described Hartmut as, “he was devastatingly attractive”. I thought could anyone look that good and a smile came along when I thought about a few of the men who I have know through the years. But I think that may be another story. As I turned the page for the twenty fifth of the month a Yellow verse, “Let your brightness shine every day” was the thought for the day. Yellow is the brightest colour of the spectrum, it is freedom and joy, laughter and fun.

THE READING WOMAN CALENDAR JANUARY 2020

THE READING ROOM CALENDAR JANUARY 2020

A friend came home from a holiday in England with a small calendar as a gift for me. Opening it I discovered twelve wonderful photos of women painted by famous painters, each one depicting a woman reading a book or newspaper and on each page of the calendar a quote from a well known personality. I thought it would be a great project to learn a little about the painter and the person who’s words were written on the calendar itself, and write a small story to share. As I turned the first page January I found the painting by Tito Conti 1842-1924 titled ‘The Good book.

Tito Conti was born and died in Florence he was the resident professor at the Academic Collage Of Fine Arts. Most of his paintings are of young and rather pretty women. I love the way the artist has brought the fine detail of the material of her dress to life the creases on what looks to be a very soft blue/grey shimmering dress with a ruffled edge, the narrow black velvet ribbon around her neck with a bow and threads hanging towards her back. I wonder how she could have read the tiny print on the pages. I found another painting of the same girl, wearing the same dress but painted from the other side of her face and without the blue earring. In fact there are a great many of the same girl on a link I found on Google, maybe she was a favourite model.

The quote for January

“The lover of books is a miner searching for gold.”

Written by Kathleen Norris. She was a very popular American novelist and journalist born in 1880. She lived to be eighty six years old and was one of the most read and highly paid authors of her time. Would you believe she wrote ninety three novels of which many were best sellers. Her stories also appeared in several magazines. Her books promoted the nobility of motherhood and the importance of the service to others. While reading through many of her excellent quotes I came across this one also about books.

“Just the knowledge that a good book is waiting at the end of a long day makes the day

happier.”

JOY AND THE COLOUR YELLOW JANUARY 2020 THE FRIDAY BLOG PAGE

JOY AND THE COLOUR YELLOW JANUARY 2020

I recently read a post about choosing one word for 2020 and how the writer of the post had used the word “focus” with great success for 2019. What a good idea that sounded to me and my mind was soon busy thinking of a word to choose, but before I could think of any word, up popped the word “JOY” then of course the colour “Yellow”, came shining into my thoughts. As a reader of colours in a very down to earth way, my next thought was how could I have a word without a colour to go with it. What fun 2020 could be, looking for the joy and yellow in the everydayness of life. What would happen if I dedicated one word and one colour to this year? What adventures would my camera and I have? How many joyful moments to share? What joyous events, times and places could be ahead of me in 2020? Life could be more optimistic and confident for me and I could write a few lines to share. No sooner had the word and colour been decided on than little quirky things happened, for me to see. On our way home from the next morning’s walk, a young woman came across the street dressed very smartly for work, she was carrying what looked be a rather heavy bag plus another bag over her shoulder. I saw those but what gave me a joyous moment was the a bright “yellow” lunch box that she was also carrying and that did put a smile on my face. And I thought one evening about the joy of being able to go to bed to read when ever I liked this year. One night to finish an exciting book I was reading I headed off to bed, it did not matter that I had left the dishes in the sink, I walked away with yellows confident knowledge that the dishes could be washed the next morning. What word or colour would you choose to add to your 2020?