The Perfect Blog Post

How I’d love to write the perfect blog post this evening!

I’ve made a few starts and pressed delete.

Perfection is the 100% we associate with maths and the like but there’s never 100% when it comes to more artsy subjects because perceptions and personal preferences get in the way.

Of course, I headed off to look at a few famous quotes about perfection and the one that jumped out at me was this one from Sylvia Plath:

Perfection is terrible; it cannot have children.

In the midst of all this searching and thinking, I recalled one of many insights from my Big Bro who has always been like the oracle to me. He made this little speech when I was new to motherhood:

There’s no such thing as the perfect parent, the perfect child, the perfect teacher, the perfect pupil, the perfect person.

Thing is: I feel that he’s the perfect ‘Big Bro.’

Big Bro and Me

Stepping Out into the Blue

Sky Blue

This is how the sky was when I went to the beach this afternoon ~ blue, blue, blue.

I feel I should nearly be apologising for posting such a plain photograph. Wouldn’t a bird, a cloud, a kite, tree tops, a steeple ~ almost anything have added to the picture?

Maybe they would but why do we need contrast all the time?  In ways there is a contrast here because this is January blue at a time when all the talk is about ‘January blues.’

Also, I have to say that ever since I read Oscar Wilde’s poem, The Ballad of Reading Gaol, I have never, ever taken a blue sky for granted:

I never saw a man who looked

With such a wistful eye

Upon that little tent of blue

Which prisoners call the sky …

Perhaps we are all prisoners of complexity in a world that offers so much in the way of simplicity?

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Place of Perfection

I was on the verge of writing a post yesterday saying that ‘Perfection has no place in the world of blogging,’ but the longing to feast my eyes upon the beauty of the sea and to seize a swim at dusk drew me away from the computer.

As I drove to the beach, I was thinking about perfection and the curse/blessing of perfectionism. I inherited a streak of perfectionism from my father but when it starts to get a firm grip on me, I think of my laid-back mother saying: ‘Don’t be such a mad perfectionist; it’ll drive you and the rest of us crazy. No one is perfect. Try your best but don’t panic if you can’t get to the end of the rainbow.’

Rainbows have a touch of perfection about them, I pondered, but they’re very fleeting. In fact, lots of aspects of nature are perfect and I thought of beautifully formed roses, tiny snowdrops, the full moon … but none of them remain perfect all the time.

As if to prove the fleetingness point, Garrarus Beach was looking totally different to any other time I have ever seen it. The sea was as calm and soothing as Mother’s words while the sky was ‘animated’ and ‘moody’ as Father would have said.

Garrarus Beach, Co. Waterford

I swam in the silky, silvery water ~ eyes drawn out to the fishing boats which were highlighted on the faraway horizon. The soft wind dried me off in seconds and I was left with that magical glow and sense of freedom that only swimming in the winter can bring.

The sand was like a blank canvas and a stick of seaweed presented itself to the writer in me. The words that flowed with abandon and complete instinct were: Perfect Cleansing.

This slideshow requires JavaScript.