Homesickness and Hairdos

3 July 2022

I've been quite homesick this week. Homesick for Normanton, my family, and (I guess because my son is living them right now) the days of school holidays spent at the service station, and then heading out with Dad after work to do whatever he had planned for us. My boy is having a wonderful time up there, and by all accounts has been a big help at the service station. It makes me proud as a parent to know I can send him off into the world and he not only enjoys himself, but acquits himself well as part of that world.

It's been super quiet at my place this week. I haven't cooked for myself once (unless you count toast... I don't). Easily the worst thing about being the grown-up is preparing the evening meal. Every. Damn. Night. Thinking of what to have, buying the groceries, and then mustering the energy after work is exhausting some times. Even when Cody cooks I still have to help and the dreaded clean up of the kitchen makes me wonder if it's worth it. But, it's a life skill, and it will be helpful if he can feed himself when he leaves home. This week though it's been minimal food preparation and clean up. It reminds me of the fortnight when I was on prac for Uni I was so busy and tired that I was sustained primarily by avocado on toast and Girl Guide biscuits.

Being home alone this week seemed like the perfect time spend hours at the hairdressers.

I've been wanting to do something different with my hair (I've cut it, grown it, coloured it as much as I can since it's naturally quite dark), so I got it permed.

How I actually feel about this fluctuates. I love that it's different, and you wouldn't believe it - bobby pins actually STAY on my head now instead of sliding out after five minutes! I don't love that I can't brush it. Sometimes it feels like a bird's nest and my two minute noodle dreads were a mistake, but a spray of water and some scrunching seems to tame them (a bit). If you're ever looking for hand exercises scrunching thick permed hair is a workout.

I can wash it a week after the treatment, so that in itself may be a challenge - I am dreading the knots by then... perhaps that's where the term dreadlocks originated...

As I said last week I'm now halfway through the 52Frames challenge. It feels good to have stuck with it this long, especially on the weeks where inspiration eluded me. I've struggled a bit in recent weeks, as my entries have seemed more like stock photos than images with a story (which is what I like, in photography as well as floristry). Last week was "What is it?", which lent itself to macro photography, so out came the bellows again to photograph a flower... there's a definite trend here.

This week is "Pattern", and lacking any large striking architectural features around here I felt like patterns in nature would be my area... again, possibly macro. I'll have a play around with what I find and see if I can put a different slant on it, moving away from generic stock style images.

Next week is "Negative Space", so I'm already thinking of how I can tell a story with that entry. Modern floral design uses a lot of negative space (as opposed to classical design where the botanical materials are placed very close together) - perhaps there's a way to incorporate that. I'll give it some more thought. For now though, I'm off to make toast, and not make a mess of the kitchen,

It's been quite a party, ain't it

Purple Fairy