It's been a long while. I've been working like a dog on new collections and have had my head in all sorts of projects (it feels very strange to be drawing seagulls and beachy things with a 45mph wind raging at the windows - even tho that is probably an average British summer day!). I'll be posting more on the new items in the near future along with news of a new stockist.
Today I wanted to write a post about love, thats also about a change of heart, and about saying "yes".
This weekend was our 8th wedding anniversary. I hate the phrase about marrying your best friend because I'm really not that in to public displays of affection / gushing like that, but thats what happened. We were friends since we met on a working holiday in 1999 (building steps in the woods and knocking down and re-building old walls for the National Trust - photo
here) and saw each other through some relationship break ups and melt downs over time as well as making lots of memories ourselves. Our relationship grew steadily and quietly, stealthily creeping in and establishing itself over time and distance.
We had a quote read at our wedding from Captain Corelli's Mandolin (we got engaged in a ruined church in the area it was set in Greece)
“Love is a temporary madness. It erupts like an earthquake and then subsides. And when it subsides you have to make a decision. You have to work out whether your roots have become so entwined together that it is inconceivable that you should ever part. Because this is what love is. Love is not breathlessness, it is not excitement, it is not the promulgation of promises of eternal passion. That is just being "in love" which any of us can convince ourselves we are. Love itself is what is left over when being in love has burned away, and this is both an art and a fortunate accident. Your mother and I had it, we had roots that grew towards each other underground, and when all the pretty blossom had fallen from our branches we found that we were one tree and not two.”
I feel that with every year this quote becomes more apt and when we chose it for the quirky link to our engagement I couldn't see the truth or meaning in it that I can now.
Monumental changes are often not a lightening bolt but a gentle shift over time. They aren't always directly our choices either. Change driven by the one who had a change of heart, the one who realised their heart was never really in it in the first place (as well as the dates and crushes that never turned in to anything at all) that made way for the life and love I have now.
Theres no real moral or leading question to get you involved. Just a gentle reminder that change can happen in the most unlikely of places and times. That a change of heart, can be a good thing. Really, to look after opportunities. I'd be in a very different place if I hadn't said yes in the early days. "Do you want to stay in contact?" - "Do you want to visit me at Uni?" - "Do you want to come and visit my friends this weekend?" - "Do you want to go out on Saturday?" (which unwittingly turned out to be - "Can I change your life on Saturday") - "Do you want to come and stay with me for a couple of days?" ...you get the idea. Sometimes, even if you aren't completely sure where it'll lead (and be it business or life), just say yes.
You can access the play list from our wedding day on Spotify
here - music was and is a huge part of "us" and it seemed fitting to have a soundtrack to the day that echo'd our time and lives together (we shared it with our guests on a wedding favour). Track listing to follow.
