This morning the lake was  black and grey glass, an occasional bubble breaking the surface.The only sounds the bellbirds and tui above me. As I sat there I was trying to absorb the peace into every corner of my mind, a truly lovely way to start a day.
Some years ago I was lying in a hospital bed, recovering from a major operation , not really caring whether I was even still alive .What kept me anchored  to life (apart from my amazing husband and kids) was that I found that I could flick though memories like turning the pages of a photo album. As I lay there , full of tubes, I could cast my mind back through images of family holidays , doing silly stuff together, sea and sand , walks in the beech forest near Wellington, the earth smell of the beech litter after rain, the misty fingers of rain on my face , the way  cold , winter Wellington sand feels when you sit there eating fish and chips. Each memory of smell, touch , taste , sound and sight rolled through my head and kept me firmly attached to life. It had never occurred to me before how important memories are - and that you never know when you might need to draw on them.
I realise that this is the prime reason that I paint - I want to capture the way something looks and even smells to me. If I can pass that on to others to jiggle their memories then I've succeeded.
Wouldn't it be sad if you were in a bad place in your life  and the only thing that you  could recall was the annoying earworm TV ad or a FB "how smart are you" post?
Make regular deposits to  your memory bank -  take time to store those images away somewhere safe, and remember to let yourself browse through and enjoy them.

 Along with the rest of the region ,we're now in the middle of a drought at Nelson Lakes - with no rain to speak of since Christmas. This has been making me think about Australia, where so many people live with droughts for years with no respite. We've been lucky enough on past trips there to stay on a few big stations and talk with the farmers about how they manage to survive drought conditions - tough, resilient people and stock!
For us it means (since we're on tank water anyway) just being a lot more thoughtful of water use . The flower gardens have been left to their own devices , the trees get an occasional bucketful of water , and ,I hate to admit this, but I've even been leaving water out for our neighbours escapee rabbits!
It's too hot to be outside most of the day, so after doing the garden jobs first thing I may find myself painting what I've picked , in this case , tomatoes from the tunnel house. Fingers crossed for rain ...
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