gilt by association

Fascinating, the power of the nose. How a smell can evoke arbitrary memories when the aroma was a subtle part of some past experience. It's like your iPod on shuffle - you never know where you're going to go.

I use the occasional piece of coal in my woodburning stove during the colder parts of our Canadian winter. As it burns with an even and gentle flame, the heat takes the chill from the air, the smell takes me back to Scotland. September.  A roaring coal fire pubside in Port Ellen's White Hart Hotel, scorching my back and burning away the shiver of an Islay night ravaged by the tail end of an Atlantic hurricane which stranded many on either side of the ferry link the island relies upon as part of its life's blood.

The memory is like gold, precious and permanent.

 

boats in the harbour, Port Ellen, Islay, Scotland

window in Port Ellen, Islay, Scotland

Carraig Fhada, the lighthouse in Port Ellen, Islay, Scotland

red:action

Red phonebooths again. At least in the abstract. I've talked about my penchant for red phonebooths before, and their metaphysical attraction. The visual attraction is a little more universal, that is it tends to inform anything which imposes itself upon my visual cortex, anything I see.

The redness acts as punctuation in the grammar of landscape, or just plain scape if you like...landscape being anywhere your eyes land. It's an exclamation point which focusses my attention on the design aspect of a particular window into my physical environment, the lay of that particular land. The image is there somewhere, I just have to find the right frame. And red is not the only culprit. I'm thinking that the primary colours hold the most power, but I suspect the more attractive aspect is the brilliance. Shine on you crazy diamond.

I like boats as well as red phonebooths, and there's often lots of colour to play with in the harbour. So, colour it is this time.